Guyana Oil and Gas News

El Dorado Offshore Inc. (EDO) says it will be investigating allegations of discrimination made by Guyanese seafarers it has recruited to work on offshore oil sector support vessels, including that they are being paid less than expatriates for the same jobs.

Introduction It has been nearly a month since the last column appeared on October 19 under the title Complex for the White Man, Disdain for Locals.

The Department of Energy (DoE) has to date received no credible reports of any form of corruption as it relates contractors and deals in the nascent oil and gas sector.

A sovereign wealth fund should only be used for rainy day planning and not to be used to supplement recurring expenditure as was done recently in Trinidad and Tobago says T&T’s former prime minister and Leader of the Opposition, Kamla Persad-Bissessar.     

Proper legislative framework to cover the oil and gas sector is essential to ensure that multinationals contribute adequately to the development of Guyana even as they invest and benefit by finding and producing oil, Trinidad and Tobago’s Leader of the Opposition Kamla Persad-Bissessar says.

Trinidad and Tobago’s Opposition Leader Kamla Persad-Bissessar on Thursday said that while Guyana should work towards ensuring its “energy security and energy independence,” its citizens should not abandon the country’s agricultural and other industrial prospects as the emerging oil and gas sector here is developed.

Despite “significant interest” in Guyana’s remaining deep water oil blocks, the Department of Energy (DoE) has no immediate plans to grant any concessions until it completes an oil and gas model contract for future Production Sharing Agreements (PSAs), which could take just over a year.

Op­po­si­tion Leader Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar will speak to the Guyanese pri­vate sec­tor on lessons Trinidad and To­ba­go has learned on man­ag­ing oil and gas rev­enues when she at­tends a func­tion in Guyana today.

Caribbean Surgery Inc. (CSI) has partnered with a Canadian-based company – Safework Solutions – to launch the Caribbean Safework Solutions Inc.

While government has said that it anticipates receiving about US$300 million in 2020, when ExxonMobil is expected to begin oil production offshore, the company says it cannot disclose its estimated production and commodity costs per barrel or how many days of the year it will be pumping oil.

The doors of oil services company G-Boats’ local office were officially opened last evening with a heavy emphasis on supporting local content through the employment of Guyanese.  G-Boats, now located at Lot 126 Quamina and Carmichael streets, Georgetown, is a subsidiary of Edison Chouest Offshore, a global company that provides supply vessels to Oil & Gas operators around the world, including ExxonMobil.

Having realized nine oil finds offshore Guyana since 2015, oil and gas people.com

The local ExxonMobil subsidiary and its partners Hess Guyana Exploration Ltd (Hess) and CNOOC Nexen Petroleum Guyana Ltd (Nexen) have been added as parties in the challenge filed by Ramon Gaskin to the grant of a petroleum production licence to the latter two companies.

Introduction During the recently-concluded United Nations General Assembly in New York, USA, the Guyana Delegation led by Foreign Minister Carl Greenidge facilitated a meeting between the Governor of the Bank of Guyana and representatives of Merrill Lynch, the investment arm of the Bank of America Corporation which had expressed an interest in Guyana’s proposed Sovereign Wealth Fund.

Anti-corruption watchdog, the Transparency Institute of Guyana Inc (TIGI) says ministers of government should give more than oral assurances to issues of conflict of interest and the Integrity Commission should lead the way in having sound policies to address the issue.

A government ad seeking consultancy services for auditing cost recovery expenses submitted by ExxonMobil has been criticised as “shoddy” and concern expressed that the “deficient” scope of the audit could see Guyana losing millions of dollars.

With its tax affairs here coming under increasing scrutiny, ExxonMobil’s subsidiary here, EEPGL has advertised for a tax adviser.

Introduction Today’s column is numbered 16 in the sequence devoted to evaluating the “top-10 development challenges” that I predict spending Guyana’s Government Take from the coming petroleum sector  has to navigate.

The Guyana government and the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador will be signing a technical cooperation agreement on oil and gas in the coming week, when Georgetown will also be hosting a visit by a 50-odd member trade mission from the territory seeking partnerships with local companies to tap the sector.

The High Commission of Canada and the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador are working with the Government of Guyana through GOINVEST to bring a Canadian oil and gas trade mission of approximately 50 persons from the province’s offshore oil and gas industry here from October 15th – 18th, 2018.