中国石化新闻网讯 据路透社5月10日东京报道，日本最大的油气勘探公司日本国际石油开发株式会社（Inpex）周四在东京说，该公司位于澳大利亚的Ichthys液化天然气（LNG）开发项目将在今年5月底前开始生产，这个项目的最新投产日期迄今已多次推迟。

Inpex高级常务执行官Masahiro Murayama在收益新闻发布会上对媒体记者说，这个项目的海上中央处理设施（CPF）的试运行将在5月底前结束，这个项目随即将开始首次天然气生产。

这个项目的进展对Inpex来说将是一个促进，由于技术问题以及承包商纠纷，这个原计划在2016年投产的项目迄今已耗资370多亿美元。

Murayama说，Ichthys项目在到明年3月结束的本财政年度的下半年中将给Inpex的利润增加240亿日元（2.1828亿美元）。Inpex周四公布该公司在上一个财政年度内获得了403.6亿日元的利润。

李峻 编译自 路透社

原文如下：

Japan's Inpex Sees Ichthys LNG Start-Up By End-May

Japan's biggest oil and gas explorer, Inpex Corp, said on Thursday it will begin production at its Ichthys liquefied natural gas (LNG) development in Australia by the end of May, the latest start date for a project that has been delayed multiple times.

Trial operations at the project's offshore central processing facility (CPF) will be completed by the end of the month, followed by the first production of gas, Inpex Senior Managing Executive Officer Masahiro Murayama told reporters at an earnings press conference.

Getting the project going will be a boost for Inpex, which has seen costs for Ichthys blow out to more than $37 billion due to technical difficulties and contractor disputes. It was originally slated to start in 2016.

Murayama said Ichthys will add as much as 24 billion yen ($218.28 million) to Inpex's profit in the second half of the financial year that runs through March 2019. The company said on Thursday it had profit of 40.36 billion yen for the year through March 2018.