Chevron- Australia gas find boosts LNG prospects

(Adds details, background)

PERTH, July 10 (Reuters) - U.S. energy major Chevron Corp CVX.N said it has made a significant gas discovery at its Iago field off western Australia, which could help expand its nearby Wheatstone liquefied natural gas (LNG) project.

Gas discoveries at the Iago-2 well, a previously untested reservoir, showed a flow rate of 53 million cubic feet a day, Chevron said in a statement.

Chevron said the Iago-2 well had strong future development prospects given its relatively shallow water location and close proximity to Chevron's Wheatstone field.

Chevron said in March it plans to develop a 5 million-tonnes-a-year LNG export facility to be supplied from Wheatstone, which has about 4.5 trillion cubic feet (tcf) of gas.

"We continue to progress a multi-train Wheatstone LNG and domestic gas development with a view to entering the front-end engineering and design phase next year for a green field mainland gas facility," Roy Krzywosinski, Managing Director of Chevron Australia, said in a statement.

Chevron is also operator of the Gorgon LNG venture in west Australia, in which Royal Dutch Shell Plc RDSa.L and Exxon Mobil Corp XOM.N each have a 25 percent stake.

The massive Gorgon project has suffered repeated delays to an original 2006 approval date due to a lengthy environmental approval process and cost pressures. There is growing uncertainty as to whether Chevron and its partners will go ahead with Gorgon, as venture partners commit to competing LNG projects in the region. (Reporting by Fayen Wong; Editing by James Thornhill)