CAPITAL: Yangon
MONETARY UNIT: Kyat
REFINING CAPACITY: 32,000 b/cd
OIL PRODUCTION: 15,000 b/d
OIL RESERVES: 50 million bbl
GAS RESERVES: 10 tcf
Commercial production from Yadana, Myanmar`s largest offshore gas field, was postponed until 2000 due to the extended delay in completion of a major power station in Thailand.
The fifth delay in construction of the Ratchaburi plant meant that Yadana start-up would be postponed at least 18 months from the original July 1998 date.
Thai state utility Electricity Generating Authority of Thailand (EGAT) said the huge power station was being built by General Electric and Mitsui & Co.
Ratchaburi was the only user of Yadana gas under the field`s initial development phase. GE and Mitsui installed the first set of 230-Mw gas turbines at Ratchaburi, about 130 km southwest of Bangkok, but the second was delayed until early 2000, about the same time as the first 735-Mw thermal unit. They blamed substandard equipment from subcontractors.
The delay affected the Yadana consortium led by Total SA, which invested $1 billion to develop the field, about 240 km south of Yangon in the Gulf of Martaban.
It also complicated the issue of payment for Yadana gas during the second contract year under the take-or-pay arrangement between Thai state petroleum firm Petroleum Authority of Thailand (PTT) and the Yadana group.
The Yadana consortium agreed to accept $50 million from PTT as settlement for the disputed take-or-pay volumes. That was $12 million less than PTT would have paid the Yadana consortium under the original take-or-pay contract.
