Kosmos Energy Produces First Gas at bp’s Africa-Based Greater Tortue Ahmeyim Project
Gas began flowing from wells to the floating production, storage, and offloading vessel and once commissioned, Phase 1 is expected to produce around 2.3 mtpa of LNG.
Kosmos Energy announced that, on December 31, 2024, first gas production started at the Greater Tortue Ahemyim (GTA) LNG project offshore Mauritania and Senegal. With bp as operator, gas from GTA’s initial phase flowed from wells to a floating production, storage, and offloading vessel prior to its transportation and liquefaction in a floating LNG vessel.
“Achieving first gas sets the stage for us to ramp up production and reach the ~90,000 boepd production target we set two years ago,” said Andrew G. Inglis, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. “With our key growth projects largely delivered and capex falling, Kosmos is well positioned going into 2025. The company remains focused on disciplined capital allocation and the generation of free cash flow that enables us to pay down debt, reduce leverage to less than 1.5x, and enhance the financial resilience of the company.”
Upon final commissioning, GTA Phase 1 may produce approximately 2.3 mtpa of LNG, along with the floating LNG vessel nameplate capacity of around 2.7 mtpa. First LNG production and cargo is scheduled for Q1 2025, enabling Mauritania and Senegal to become an LNG production hub in West Africa.
Greater Tortue Ahemyim; image credit: Kosmos Energy
bp’s GTA Project
In February 2024, bp announced that the floating LNG vessel, Gimi, arrived at its destination on the Mauritania and Senegal maritime border for the first phase of the GTA LNG project. GTA Phase 1 development is operated by bp, Kosmos Energy, PETROSEN, and SMH. Gimi is owned and operated by Golar LNG, and it traveled over 9,000 nautical miles from Singapore in November 2023. More than 36 million work hours were spent on the vessel’s construction.
The GTA LNG project will produce gas from reservoirs in deep water, about 120 km offshore, through a subsea system to a floating production, storage, and offloading vessel. This vessel will initially process the gas to remove heavy hydrocarbon components. Natural gas will be transported via pipeline to the vessel at the GTA hub, then cryogenically cooled in four liquefaction trains and stored before transfer to LNG carriers. Gimi can store up to 125,000 m3 of LNG.
Following this delivery, in June 2024, bp’s floating production, storage, and offloading vessel arrived at its offshore destination on the maritime border of Mauritania and Senegal for GTA Phase 1. The vessel was constructed at the COSCO Qidong Shipyard in China and is expected to process over 500 million standard cubic feet of gas per day.
It will separate water, condensate, and impurities from the gas prior to transportation via pipeline to a floating LNG vessel at the Hub Terminal approximately 10 km off the coast. The vessel cryogenically cool, liquefy, and store the gas before export via LNG carrier or allocation to Mauritania and Senegal. It will have up to 140 people on board during normal operation, with a surface area of 115,200 square feet and a height of approximately 110 feet. The FPSO is comprised of more than 81,000 tons of steel, 37,000 m of pipe spools, and 1.52 million m of cable.
