Gazprom and Linde sign helium agreement
Published by Anna Nicklin,
Assistant Editor
Hydrocarbon Engineering,
The Linde Group and Gazprom Export LLC, a 100% subsidiary of OAO Gazprom, have signed a sale and purchase agreement for the offtake of helium from Gazprom’s Amur helium plant, which is currently under construction in the far east of Russia, as part of the development of Gazprom’s Power of Siberia gas project.
Linde will become a purchaser of significant volumes of helium from the new production facility. The plant is due to be commissioned in parallel with the start of the flow of natural gas extracted from the Chayandinskoye field along the new gas transportation route – Yakutia-Khabarovsk-Vladivostok.
Helium is used in a wide range of applications, including the manufacture and operation of MRI (Magnet Resonance Imaging) scanners as well as the manufacture of semiconductors, LCD screens and fibre optic cable. As it can only be economically produced from helium-rich natural gas sources, there are only a limited number of helium production facilities around the world.
Linde’s Engineering Division is the licenser for the cryogenic gas separation technology at the Amur Gas Processing Plant and will engineer and supply units for ethane and natural gas liquid (NGL) extraction and nitrogen rejection, as well as for helium purification, liquefaction and storage.
The Chayandinskoye field, together with other resources owned by Gazprom in the East Siberian region, forms one of the largest reservoirs of helium globally. The Amur helium plant is set to become a significant new source of helium when it is fully operational that will help to meet the growing global demand.
“Linde is very proud to have entered this long-term agreement with Gazprom Export to purchase significant volumes of helium produced from this major project, and we look forward to the first supplies of helium targeted for 2021,” said Sanjiv Lamba, Member of the Executive Board of Linde AG.
Read the article online at: https://www.hydrocarbonengineering.com/gas-processing/15032018/gazprom-and-linde-sign-helium-agreement/
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