August 18 - The largest piece of a turret for Shell's Prelude floating liquefied natural gas (FLNG) facility has set sail from Dubai for the Samsung Heavy Industries shipyard in Geoje, South Korea, where the facility is under construction.
ALE successfully completed the weighing, transportation and load-out of the combined modules, weighing 3,395 tonnes, which will form a structure set to become the world's biggest turret when it arrives in South Korea.
The modules and grillage were weighed using ALE's 600-tonne jacks and load cells and amounted to 3,395 tonnes.
The modules were then transported from the assembly yard at DryDocks World to the quayside.
Here, the modules were loaded-out onto CJ Korea Express using 176 axle lines of SPMTs. The trailers were configured within three days.
The unit will be used in the construction of the turret, which is part of a mooring system designed to ensure that Prelude FLNG can operate safely in the most extreme weather conditions.
At almost 100 m high, the turret will run through the front of the facility and connect to giant chains that will keep it moored securely over the Prelude gas field.
"Designed in Monaco, built in Dubai, shipped to South Korea and for use off Australia, the turret is an example of the truly global nature of this project," said Matthias Bichsel, projects and technology director at Shell.
Once complete, Prelude FLNG will operate in a remote basin around 200 km off Australia's north-west coast, for around 25 years. It will produce about 3.6 million tonnes of LNG a year to help meet rising global demand for cleaner energy.
