Case Study:
You are the Supply Chain Manager for a Midstream natural gas company. Your latest customer is an E&P company active in the Bakken Shale in a North Dakota.
The company plans on drilling ten (10) gas wells over the next year with at least three (3) coming online in six (6) months. Your company has been approached to build the necessary gathering and processing facilities to get this gas to market. It is anticipated that they will have 30,000 Mcfd of inlet plant gas (12) months from now. But, the plant needs to be built to handle future production growth.
Since you have completed the project risk analysis, the next step in the process is to find and, evaluate, prospective vendors for the key components of the processing plant itself. Obviously, longer "lead time" equipment will dictate the project completion timeline so, compiling a list of potential Suppliers and sending-out your "Requests for Proposals" (bids) is critical at this point.
1) Using the equipment list below, find at least (2) Suppliers for each component.
2) Evaluate them as a potential Supplier based on the following criteria.
a. Equipment available (do they have some or all of what you need?)
b. History
c. Service territory
d. Financial stability
3) List the Supplier's respective Model # for each component (if available).
In addition, state the pros & cons of the outright purchase vs. leasing the "large ticket" equipment.
Jacoby provides a good amount of information on procurement, Supplier selection and, the RFP process. In order to show that you understand these concepts, refer to Jacoby where appropriate. (This does not mean just listing the text book as a citation or footnote. It means stating information from Jacoby about this process.)
You will need to make a formal, 2,000-word minimumreport to the project committee of your findings and recommendations for which Suppliers to contact for bids. You are not soliciting bids nor trying to establish delivery timelines at this point. It is just a report showing who carries the necessary equipment and what Vendors you would recommend.
Just so you know, I searched the internet and found a supplier for every one of these.
Equipment List
I. Plant Inlet
a. Compressors
i. Two (2) 1500 Hp electric-powered
ii. One (1) 1500 Hp natural gas powered
b. "Slug" Catcher
c. Oil/Gas Separator
d. Dehydration Unit
e. Gas Scrubber
f. 6" Ultrasonic inlet gas meter w/chromatograph
II. Plant
a. Skid-mounted ("train") cryogenic plant designed for future volume increases
b. Skid-mounted "J-T" plant for added NGL extraction
III. Plant Residue
a. (2) Turbine NGL meters capable of measuring up to 250 gals/minute (GPM)
b. (2) 6" Ultrasonic inlet gas meter w/chromatograph