Gas field scheduling

Abstract

Woodside Offshore Petroleum is the operator in the development of new gas fields in Australia's North West Shelf project. Sequencing the development of new gas fields in this project is a key determinant of its return on investment. This development sequence has constraints imposed by infrastructure and contractual obligations as well as natural features. The determination of an optimal or very good solution may involve a number of techniques from operations research. The study group attempted several approaches to the problem, principal amongst them being mathematical programming and dynamic programming. A few other heuristic approaches were also considered. The mathematical programming approach was able to yield solutions to small instances of the problem. The group was able to identify several avenues for further research and work on the problem is ongoing.