INPEX raised its 2025 net profit forecast in early August on the back of strong production at its flagship Ichthys LNG project, despite a month-and-a-half-long planned maintenance shutdown of the floating facility starting in August.
Two months prior, the Japanese energy company received regulatory approval for a development drilling campaign at Ichthys, covering the drilling, completion and flowback of up to 13 new development wells.
The 2025 net profit forecast was revised upwards by 23 per cent to US$2.5 billion (370 billion Japanese yen), further bolstered by higher oil price assumptions and a weaker yen.
Meanwhile, net profit for the six months ending in June was up5.1 per cent to about 225 billion yen.
INPEX expects to ship 116 LNG cargoes this year, reflecting steady production at Ichthys. With the improved 2025 outlook, the company also raised its annual dividend forecast and announced a share buyback program.
Daisuke Yamada, Senior Managing Executive Officer at INPEX, said: “Strengthening the structural profit base along with improving resilience to low oil prices and yen appreciation has built confidence in future earnings.”
Ichthys’ two trains have a combined nameplate production capacity of 8.9 million tonnes a year, with 8.4 million tonnes going to existing sales and purchase agreements and remaining half a million tonnes made available on the spot market.
INPEX’s 2025-2027 medium-term plan will see the sustaining and strengthening of the framework to enable stable mid- to long-term production at an expanded 9.3 million tonnes a year.
Central to the idea of steady operations at Ichthys is finding new gas deposits in the surrounding Browse Basin off the coast of northern Western Australia.
Last year, Hitoshi Okawa, Senior Executive Vice President and Head of Overseas Projects at INPEX noted the company had learned from its failure a few years ago to deliver easy tie-back satellite gas structures to Ichthys and so had reworked its exploration strategy.
Okawa remained tight-lipped around which areas would be drilled and when, but noted INPEX’s policy was to continue exploration in the vicinity of Ichthys.
PHASE-TWO DEVELOPMENT WELLS APPROVED
Oil and gas regulator NOPSEMA confirmed in June that it had accepted the environmental plan for the Ichthys phase two drilling, comprising up to 13 new wells in waters between 235 and 275 metres deep, which includes the potential for workovers and well intervention of existing and planned development wells.
Drilling is expected to start in 2027 and INPEX intends to use a semi-submersible mobile offshore drilling rig (or drillship) for the new campaign, while anchor handling supply vessels and a platform supply vessel will provide support.
There will also be inspection, repair and maintenance or light well intervention vessels on hand to undertake additional well-related activities.
Concurrently with developmental drilling, INPEX is shortlisting candidates of discovered gas resources that could be exploited to provide backfill gas for Ichthys, as the company plans to move ahead with a third liquefaction train to supply gas to the Asia-Pacific region by the early 2030s.
The onshore site in Darwin has been secured to host up to six trains, and the expansion of a third train would work apace with a carbon capture and storage (CCS) project with a targeted start of around 2030.
INPEX began pre-front engineering and design (pre-FEED) work at the proposed Bonaparte CCS project in mid-April, following completion of an engineering concept and comprehensive appraisal program that included up to 1,800 square kilometres of three-dimensional seismic surveying and two CCS appraisal wells.
This confirmed the presence of a high-quality saline aquifer reservoir in the Bonaparte Basin, according to INPEX, with thick sealing formations considered suitable for safe and permanent carbon storage.
INPEX said: “The Bonaparte CCS joint venture intends to transport and store carbon dioxide safely and permanently offshore northern Australia in the Bonaparte basin, which has a potential carbon storage capacity of more than 10 million tonnes per year.”
Ichthys LNG is expected to be the anchor customer of the Bonaparte CCS project and the joint venture partners believe it will substantially contribute to decarbonising northern Australia and the Asia-Pacific region.
INPEX holds a 53 per cent interest in the joint venture, which was formed in 2022, along with French company TotalEnergies (26 per cent) and Woodside (21 per cent).
UNPLANNED STOPPAGE AT BLADIN POINT PLANT
INPEX’s Bladin Point facility near Darwin – part of the Ichthys project’s onshore processing facilities – was forced to halt operations in late August due to an issue with a flange flare.
Gas is delivered from the Ichthys field via an 890-kilometre subsea pipeline to Bladin Point, where it is processed at the facility which operates uninterruptedly to ensure constant supply.
The company said unplanned shutdowns such as this occurred when the facility experienced operational trips or equipment outages that necessitated diverting the flow of product to the ground flare system while the cause was identified and rectified.
During these events, safety is prioritised with the shutdown of key equipment, while flaring activities are controlled to minimise environmental and operational impacts.
The specific technical details around the flange flare event have not been disclosed but required immediate attention, with the shutdown comprising the isolation and management of the flaring systems onsite to prevent any potential hazard and to facilitate maintenance and repairs.
This unplanned stoppage coincided with the broad maintenance program and shutdown of the Ichthys LNG facilities, the largest maintenance in recent years and includes extensive servicing and replacement of all heat exchangers as well as other critical equipment across both LNG processing trains.
Okawa explained the company had encountered some temporary production issues in August 2024, when a flaw in the heat exchangers of the second train caused production to stop.
The issue was rectified and the facility resumed operations by November, but Okawa said the company was not taking any risk of a similar problem occurring.
He said: “As we had no definite technical assurance that the heat exchangers would function stably for a long duration, we made the decision to replace all of them.
“As we are scheduling large-scale shutdown [at] Ichthys starting from August 2025, we will carry out replacement at that stage.
“Continuing steady operation is paramount. Any concerns, no matter how small, must be removed.”
