Orion Solar has been awarded a contract to supply a Sabik LED350 high intensity marine lantern to Chevron Australia for use on Barrow Island, WA. Barrow Island is a 202 km2 (78 sq mi) island located 50 kilometres (31 mi) off the coast of Western Australia and is the site of the liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant associated with the Gorgon gas project. The Gorgon gas project is currently under construction and will become Australia’s largest resource project, producing 40 trillion cubic feet (1,100km3) of gas from about mid 2014.The Sabik LED350 high intensity marine lantern delivers 1400 candela of light and has a range of 12 nautical miles. The light will be white with an IALA flash code of 15 flashes/min and will operate 24 hours a day 7 days a week. The lantern will be powered by a Rigel solar engine which will provide up to 10 days of redundancy.
Orion is supplying the marine lantern and solar engine through Clough Amec Pty Ltd, who are the provider of engineering services to Chevron Australia’s facilities off the northwest coast of Australia.
The installation of the light and the solar engine will need to be able to withstand the cyclonic winds which are common on the northwest coast of Western Australia. In fact, the World Meteorological Organization established Barrow Island as the location of the highest non-tornado wind gust at 408 km/hr (253 mph) during tropical cyclone Olivia on 10 April 1996.