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Oil Search business development manager Jesse Lee told the South-East Asia Australia Offshore Conference in Darwin last month that DME could be used as a substitute for diesel and liquid petroleum gas, and had potential future use in power generation.
DME was also more environmentally friendly than other fuels, it could be easily handled, and it enabled the exploitation of “stranded” gas fields that could not otherwise be commercially developed, according to Lee.
Since the fuel was derived from methanol, the two products could be co-produced in the one plant using natural gas as feedstock.
The planned plant’s ability to produce either methanol or DME would provide a natural hedge against market changes, Lee said.
Oil Search and its partners, Itochu and Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, aim to begin production by 2011.
Oil Search operates all of PNG’s producing oil and gas fields.
