ExxonMobil’s flaring of over nine billion cubic feet of natural gas could have been avoided had a proposed gas-to-shore pipeline project been implemented but it was stalled because a plan to determine the best location was rejected by government officials as some wanted to handpick a site, former Petroleum Advisor Jan Mangal says.
He said that ExxonMobil had already established a team to discuss the project and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) had said that it would fund a feasibility study of this country’s coastline to determine the most suitable location for the landing of the pipes and setting up of a power station.
“Myself and the IDB were pushing for a comprehensive feasibility study of the whole coastline so as to pick the best location for the landing of the pipeline onshore. This would be the location for the gas plant and the power plant would be nearby. But the Ministry of (Public) Infrastructure, they were against a comprehensive feasibility study. It seemed they just wanted to pick a location, and they proposed Mahaicony and another site just across the Demerara River from Georgetown. I was very suspicious of the Mahaicony option because it made no sense to me and was a swamp,” Mangal told the Stabroek News in an interview last week.