Safe, reliable maintenance for Esso Australia

In 2024, Esso Australia needed a maintenance partner to take on a major alliance contract with several key priorities:

• Transition from an incumbent contractor without disruption
• Maintain safe, reliable operations across ageing, late-life assets
• Improve productivity, cost efficiency and asset integrity
• Effectively execute shutdowns with schedule certainty
• Scale workforce capacity rapidly to meet fluctuating demand
• Embed a strong safety culture aligned to Esso’s leadership expectations
• Integrate to simplify work processes and reduce inefficient handoffs

In January 2025, Wood was awarded the long-term maintenance alliance contract, building on a strong, existing presence in the Gippsland region where Wood has supported Esso Australia on a brownfield modifications contract for over 20 years.

Integrated, scalable delivery model

Wood delivers a fully integrated maintenance solution across offshore and onshore assets, supported by a 230 strong blue-collar workforce and 100 white-collar personnel from across Australia. At peak, Wood has mobilised and sustained – 300+ personnel to suit demand.

A key strength is the ability to scale quickly using a reliable, local workforce. Within a three-month period, Wood onboarded around 150 personnel, drawing on a well-established regional network built over many years in Gippsland.

This depth of local capability enables Wood to flex resourcing in line with demand and maintain consistent delivery across offshore operations, Longford and Long Island Point - without the constraints typically associated with regional labour markets.

Seamless transition from incumbent

Wood delivered a seamless transition from the incumbent contractor with no disruption to ongoing operations, maintaining continuity of work from day one.

Site delivery improved from the outset, with maintenance execution moving in a more positive, structured direction and early gains in effectiveness and productivity. Within the first six months, this translated into approximately A$4 million in maintenance improvements, demonstrating that the transition was risk-free and value-accretive from the start.

Smart maintenance that challenges traditional approaches

Wood challenges traditional maintenance approaches, introducing smarter, more efficient ways of working, including:

• Campaign-based execution to maximise field efficiency
• Using Artificial h4lligence (AI) approaches to pursue insights from Esso’s extensive historic maintenance performance and challenge whether the current planned and corrective maintenance is optimised across cost and risk
• Alternate coating and inspection methodologies
• Use of rope access via IRATA Certification to complement traditional execution approaches
• Leveraging in-house engineering, integrity and pipeline expertise

Safety-led alliance culture

Wood embedded a strong safety culture early by maintaining visible leadership in the field, ensuring leaders were consistently present, engaged and connected to frontline work.

This visibility, combined with a genuine one-team approach, helped build trust quickly and create an environment where teams felt empowered to speak up, challenge and continuously improve. Wood aligns with Esso Australia’s alliance behaviours, placing transparency, accountability and shared outcomes at the centre of delivery.

A key focus area was supporting and leading the rollout of Esso’s personal safety management system (PSMS), where Wood teams are recognised for setting the standard in the field during early implementation.

Wood’s performance was recognised at Esso Australia’s annual Gippsland Safety Forum in 2026, where it was awarded the Alliance Leadership & Safety Culture Award. The award reflected the team’s ability to maintain strong safety outcomes while transitioning the contract, as well as its leadership in driving a positive, sustainable safety culture across the alliance.

A full life cycle partner able to add value beyond maintenance

Wood acts as an extension of Esso Australia’s team, providing targeted engineering and consulting support alongside maintenance to strengthen capability where and when needed. This includes areas such as reliability and integrity- ensuring decisions are informed by both on-the-ground insight and technical expertise.

By integrating these capabilities into day-to-day operations, Wood helps Esso Australia close capability gaps, streamline execution and unlock additional value across the asset lifecycle – beyond maintenance.