Guyana Oil and Gas News

While declaring that no laws were broken in the selection of companies to come here to bid on Guyana’s first three lifts of oil from the Liza-1 field, Director of the Department of Energy (DE) Dr.

International lawyer and environmental activist Melinda Janki has called on members of the United Nations to request Guyana to halt all oil activities until human rights are protected.

Under growing criticism over a previously unannounced sale of Guyana’s first three cargoes of oil from ExxonMobil’s Liza-1 field, the Department of Energy (DoE) yesterday defended its plan, saying that the interim arrangement was approved as the full extent of the quality of the crude is still unknown and it wants to set a benchmark to guard against any possible down-pricing in future sales.

As government prepares to meet today with prospective buyers of Guyana’s first three cargoes of crude from ExxonMobil’s Liza-1 field offshore Guyana, attorney Sanjeev Datadin says he will be filing court action to block any agreements made during those discussions.

Oil traders from Houston, Geneva and London are expected to begin bidding on Monday on some of Guyana’s first oil cargoes, Bloomberg news has reported.

First oil production from ExxonMobil’s Liza-1 field offshore Guyana is still expected this month with the oil major, having completed hookup of the equipment, currently testing it. 

Guyana has been named as one of three countries whose oil exports in the immediate future could impact last week’s agreed production cuts by member countries of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and Russia by an additional 500,000 barrels per day in order to seek to support global oil prices.  The mention of Guyana in terms of its soon-to-be status as an oil-exporting country comes in the wake of the disclosure by ExxonMobil several weeks ago that its ‘first oil’ time frame for Guyana had been brought forward from March last year to December 2019.    The December 6 Associated Press report names Guyana, Norway and Canada as three non-OPEC-member countries whose oil production and supply volumes in the period ahead “could make up for any cuts from OPEC and Russia.”  Coming after what, reportedly, was a period of protracted discussion at OPEC’s Vienna conference in Austria last week, the group’s aim, OPEC says, is to act collectively to support global price levels.

The Ministry of Finance and the Bank of Guyana (BoG) yesterday signed a pact which brings closer the operationalisation of the Natural Resource Fund, which is to receive oil revenues, a move hailed by government as demonstrative of its transparency in the management of the oil and gas sector.

The Ministry of Finance and the Bank of Guyana today signed a pact which brings closer the operationalisation of the Natural Resource Fund which is to receive oil revenues. 

Oil and gas commentator Christopher Ram has flayed the latest version of the government’s local content policy and has also faulted the local private sector.

A partnership sealed this year between National Hardware Guyana Limited and the Trinidadian firm Concepts and Services Company Limited (CSCL), an oil and gas support company, is an example of what local content capacity building should be, President of the Georgetown Chamber and Commerce and partner in the company Nicholas Deygoo-Boyer says.

Guyana’s Natural Resource Fund (NRF), which will hold oil revenues, is to be located in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York rather than the Central Bank of Guyana, Minister of Finance Winston Jordan has revealed.

ExxonMobil affiliate Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited (EEPGL) says locally-trained engineers are eligible for engineering posts which the company is looking to fill but questions persist as to whether Guyanese will be hired for the most technical of these.

Introduction Last week’s column gave a brief overview of the Third Draft of Government’s Local Content Policy which was released to the bemused public by Dr.

While global oilfield services provider Halliburton has established an office at Eccles on the East Bank of Demerara and hired local staff, the company plans to lay off some 800 workers in the United States at its El Reno operations and close its Oklahoma City office, the Associated Press (AP) yesterday reported.

ExxonMobil’s local subsidiary Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited (EEPGL) has applied to the Environmental Protection Agency for authorization to drill some 31 wells in three offshore blocks.

To provide support to oil and gas operators here, Houston, Texas-headquartered subsea engineering and applied technology firm Oceaneering has established an office in Guyana.

Government seems afraid to question ExxonMobil about the huge disparity in costs between the Stabroek Block’s Liza-1 and Liza-2 projects but this issue needs to be urgently addressed lest this country loses out again on needed revenue, says former Petroleum Advisor Jan Mangal and economist Darshanand Khusial.

Introduction Last week’s column highlighted the two Government of Guyana’s (GoG) foundational spending recommendations that I make, based on Guyana’s projected petroleum revenues.

Kwame Jantuah, Ghana’s head of the African Energy Consortium Ltd and Senior Vice-President of the Freddie Jordan Oil Com-pany Ltd, has told Guyanese that the onus is on them to equip themselves or lose out on opportunities in the oil sector.