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Italy |
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Major Brazilian gas pipeline project
Through the end of 2005, the Brazilian state-owned oil/gas company Petrobras will invest US$1 billion in the Amazon region to transport natural gas from Urucu to Manaus to generate electric power. Construction of the gas pipeline from Coari to Manaus, with 400 km along the Solimoes river will cost $525 million. About 9 MM (million) m3/d (318 MMcfd) of gas are presently re-injected in wells in Urucu due to lack of a pipeline. The planned Coari to Manaus pipeline will provide a transport link for Urucu and Jurua gas fields, located about 700 km west of Manaus.
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Route of Brazil’s Coari to Manaus 400-km gas pipeline to market Urucu region gas now being re-injected.
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Tenaris subsidiary Confab will supply 400 km of 20-in. steel tubing, and Italy’s Socotherm subsidiary Soco-Ril do Brasil will coat the pipes externally and internally with polyethylene and liquid epoxy, respectively, for the Coari to Manaus line. Additionally, Soco-Ril is to coat 11 km of the pipe with concrete, 1.9-in. thick, through swamp areas around the Amazon jungle.
Production of the pipes started in February and due to project delivery schedules, several production cycles are forecast until December 2005. The total amount forecast concerning coatings is about $5.5 million.
The gas supply to Manaus will benefit domestic electric power consumers, since there will be a decrease to 2.5% from 6.5% in the installment charged in electricity bills concerning subsidies toward diesel oil consumption of thermal plants in Manaus. The Coari to Manaus pipeline, which may be completed by 2006, will have a capacity of 10.5 MMm3/d (371 MMcfd) and may transport 5.5 MMm3/d (194 MMcfd) by 2006. Manaus will consume 4 MMm3/d to replace the diesel oil used in electric power generation.
Meanwhile, Petrobras will hire 3,800 workers, and plans to undertake projects in the region targeting agriculture, fishing and handcraft sectors. The construction of a thermal plant along with Eletrobras is in Petrobras’ plans as well. The unit, costing $500 million, may have a capacity of 700 MW. The Urucu region, active since 1986, produces 60,000 bopd from 60 wells and 10 MMm3/d (353 MMcfd) gas. Part of the gas is directed to the production of 1,500 mt/d of LPG (liquefied petroleum gas).
The Amazon project has attracted a number of legal challenges and has also been the target of criticisms by conservationists. In January, a Brazilian judge lifted an injunction barring Petrobras from starting work on the controversial gas pipeline in the heart of the Amazon jungle. And Federal Justice Vallisney de Souza Oliveira authorized Petrobras to start clearing the jungle pipeline route between Coari and Manaus. A 131-man army engineering team expected to begin clearing forest from the route had to return to Manaus when the injunction was granted. 
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