Australian largest oil&gas company approves 2 bln dollars gas development

Australia's largest oil and gas company Woodside Petroleum on Friday announced it had approved a 2 billion U.S. dollars gas development on Australia's north west shelf.

Woodside and joint venture partners BHP Billiton Petroleum, BP, Chevron Australia, Japan Australia LNG and Shell will develop the 1.6 trillion feet of gas using subsea pipeline infrastructure to the existing Goodwyn A platform, the company said in a statement.

The project is the fourth major gas development for the North West Shelf Project in the past seven years as the company commercializes the area's gas reserves "in a timely and efficient manner to extend plateau production," Woodside chief executive Peter Coleman said.

At 11:55 local time (AEDT), Woodside's shares were trading 39 Australian cents (28 U.S. cents), or 1.42 percent higher to 27.24 Australian dollars (19.77 U.S. dollars) from Thursday's close.

Cash-rich Woodside scraped its proposed takeover of Papua New Guinea focused Oil Search on Dec. 8, saying increasing its initially rejected offer would be detrimental to its shareholders if oil prices continued to slide.

Benchmark Brent Crude prices have fallen almost 50 percent this year to below 40 U.S. dollars per barrel on Thursday on the increasing global supply glut as the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries maintain high production to maintain market share, staving off competition from outside producers.

The project will start production in the second half of 2019 from five wells, with the remaining three others to come online in the first half of 2020.