FC60 and FC70 Moomba Accommodation Camp Concrete Works

Project overview

Spanning the borders of northeast South Australia and southwest Queensland, the Cooper and Eromanga Basins house Australia’s largest onshore oil and gas field development. Raw gas and ethane are processed at the Moomba plant in the Cooper Basin and then piped to domestic east coast gas markets as well as the GLNG project for export to Asia. Natural gas liquids recovered at the Moomba plant are sent together with stabilised crude oil and condensate via a 659km pipeline to Port Bonython, South Australia, for further processing.

In 2013, Santos embarked on major infrastructure upgrade works across their Cooper Basin Field sites. These works required new accommodation units at for the workforce.

Ballestrin was contracted to by McMahon Services to undertake the supply and placement of precast and insitu concrete works for the Moomba FC60 and FC70 Accommodation Camp upgrade for Santos. Works included forming, pouring and finishing precast footing blocks complete with cast in items and then transportation to site, supply and placement of insitu concrete for slabs, stairs and other concrete elements, and the completion of all quality assurance documentation to Santos specifications. The precast concrete footing pads were formed in Adelaide and then transported to site and placed producing project program savings and ensuring footing blocks achieved the required strength through curing in more favourable conditions.

The project delivery team peaked at 15 and delivered over 400m³ of placed concrete over an 18 week period to ensure the project was complete in time for the proposed infrastructure upgrade works.

Mitigating environmental factors such as heat and high winds had the potential to delay works. To overcome these challenges, the team worked early morning shifts commencing at 3.00am when temperatures were more favourable.

The requirement to place concrete in restricted workspaces, posed issues with manual transportation of concrete. The team used a Bobcat mounted concrete pump to place concrete accurately in tight spaces, reducing the need for manual handling.

The team utilised a skid steer mounted concrete pump to place concrete accurately in tight spaces, reducing the need for manual handling. The project was successfully delivered on program with no zero lost time injuries and environmental incidents.