As it underscored the global tiers of safety mechanisms taken in the pipeline installation and delivery of gas for this country’s Gas to Energy (GTE) project, ExxonMobil says that the laying will be completed by the end of this year and the pipes will be filled with nitrogen until government’s completion of the integrated plant.
“We will not start-up bringing gas onshore until the plant is ready. The plant has a safety system that allows you to start up properly. We have to wait until the plant is ready. In the meantime, we will do what is called inerting the pipe, which is preserving the pipeline. You preserve a pipe by putting a gas that is inert that doesn’t combine with anything, doesn’t corrode with anything, etcetera,” GTE Project Manager Friedrich Krispin told Stabroek News during an interview last week.
“So nitrogen will be inside the pipe. We fill it up with nitrogen and then we wait and whenever the plant is ready, we will release all of the nitrogen, which doesn’t cost anything to the atmosphere, then we start bringing in gas,” he added.