Introduction
Under Section 31 of the Petroleum Act, official notification was given last month, by ExxonMobil and its partners (Nexen Energy and Hess Corporation), to the Government of Guyana confirming the find (discovery) of commercial quantities of oil and gas in the Stabroek Block. A few weeks later, in today’s column I conclude my commentary on the four dynamic attributes of this discovery, which I had singled out for initial attention in this ongoing series of columns, namely: 1) its geophysical features, 2) the ownership and entrepreneurial responsibility for its commercialization, 3) the likely operational cost-price relation and 4) today’s focus: the geo-strategic challenges.
These challenges mainly arise from Venezuela’s aggression in support of its unworthy claim that the Guyana oil and gas find is located in its territorial waters. This geo-strategic aspect, is potentially, the most impactful of all the attributes I have listed for consideration. The basis for this claim is captured in the following quotation derived from Michael Klare’s celebrated work entitled Blood and Oil (2004):