Several civil society groups and members of the public have issued a call for the time allocated for questions and comments to be expanded at an up-coming virtual hearing on Esso’s planned Yellowtail offshore oil project.
An earlier email sent to Jesus Bronchalo, Business and Development Mana-ger, Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limit-ed (EEPGL), and copied to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) re-quested a Virtual Meeting on the Yellowtail Project and this was agreed to by Bronchalo. However, concerns are now being raised on the time allocated for public participation. In an email letter seen by this newspaper, the group is requesting that the EEPGL/ERM team and EPA staff presentations be combined and limited to 30 minutes. This request, according to the email, was justified “… based on the experience and feedback of stakeholders who have attended the face to face meetings, there is great concern about the extremely limited time made available for the public to ask questions and make comments.”