Close to 140 miles off the coast of Western Australia, Ichthys is the largest discovery of hydrocarbon liquids in Australia in 40 years. INPEX Australia, which discovered the gas and condensate field back in 2000, is now leading the Ichthys LNG Project — currently under construction and ranked among the largest and most significant oil and gas projects in the world.
Its very nature also makes the project a huge safety and security concern. In turn, it represents the largest order value ever received for a single project by HIMA, which has been chosen by the Ichthys joint venture to address those concerns. HIMA will supply the safety instrumented systems (SIS) and the fire and gas (F&G) system.
The Ichthys LNG Project is essentially three mega-projects rolled into one, involving some of the largest offshore facilities in the industry, a state-of-the-art onshore processing facility, and a 550-mile pipeline uniting the two. Production is scheduled to begin in late 2017, and is expected to produce 8.9 million metric tons of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and 1.6 million metric tons of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) per year, plus more than 100,000 barrels of condensate a day at peak.
HIMA will supply the SIS and F&G system using HIMax, a safety system designed to provide uninterrupted system operation throughout the entire life of the plant, while maximizing plant availability, productivity and safety.
The high-integrity pressure protection systems (HIPPS) rely on a Planar4 system, which can be used up to SIL 4 in accordance with IEC 61508. Onshore and offshore facilities and the pipeline are connected to about 25,000 safety I/O points, allocated in about 430 cabinets distributed via safeethernet, where applicable.
Besides the SIS/FGS/HIPPS, the HIMA scope of supply includes delivery of the pre-FID system development and standard application design and testing. The cybersecurity and network management with related hardware installation, the addressable fire system for the living quarters with the related detectors and the network management system for the SIS/F&G network complete the deliverables.
The HIMA hardware and firmware provided are certified up to SIL 3 according to AS/IEC 61508. HIMA will use the principles of AS/IEC 61511 in designing and testing the SIS and F&G system. The functional safety management (FSM) plan will be used to manage all stages of the design, implementation and manufacturing process.
