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FM
Former Member

Gilbakka and his relatives who are denizens in the Atlantic Ocean offshore Guyana are looking with interest at ongoing activities surrounding oil & gas production and at what is reported nationwide & internationally on those  activities. 

As a GNI Political Discussion Forum member, Gilbakka is pleased to start this thread dedicated to oil & gas. All fellow members are invited to post news reports & analyses for discussion.

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Tanker to lift first million barrels of oil this weekend

Crude oil tanker – YANNIS P – will over the weekend lift the first million barrels of oil from the Stabroek Block offshore Guyana.

The vessel, YANNIS P, currently sailing under the flag of Marshall Islands

The crude tanker which was built in 2010, will begin loading this weekend, ExxonMobil’s Public and Government Affairs Advisor, Janelle Persaud said on Friday.
She added that ExxonMobil will process the cargo in its own refining system as was previously announced.
On December 20, 2019, United States oil giant ExxonMobil announced the commenced production of Guyana’s oil in the Stabroek Block, where 15 discoveries of crude in commercial quantities have been made since 2015.
In September 2019, the Liza Destiny floating production, storage and offloading vessel (FPSO) arrived in Guyana’s waters. The vessel is a significant component of the Liza Phase One Development, which involves four undersea drill centres with 17 production wells. Besides its production capacity of 120,000 barrels of oil per day, it also has an overall storage volume of 1.6 million barrels.
During normal operations, there will be at least 80 persons living and working onboard the vessel.
With the 120,000 barrels expected daily from production in the Liza Phase One Development, it is estimated that Guyana will earn some US$300 million annually.
ExxonMobil had previously said there is potential for at least five FPSO vessels in the Stabroek Block, producing more than 750,000 barrels of oil per day by 2025. Liza Phase Two Development is expected to start up by mid-2022. It had been reported that the project would use the Liza Unity FPSO to produce up to 220,000 barrels per day.
With Hess Guyana Exploration Ltd holding 30 per cent interest in the Stabroek Block, ExxonMobil’s affiliate, Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited (EEPGL) has 45 per cent interest and is also the operator of the 6.6 million acres block while CNOOC Petroleum Guyana Limited, a wholly-owned subsidiary of China’s state-owned CNOOC Limited, holds the remaining 25 per cent interest.
In 2015, the oil giant announced a significant oil discovery on the Stabroek Block, located approximately 120 miles offshore Guyana. The well encountered more than 295 feet (90 metres) of high-quality oil-bearing sandstone reservoirs.
On May 8, 2015, days prior to General and Regional Elections, the then Government – PPP/C – had announced that ExxonMobil discovered hydrocarbons offshore Guyana while drilling the Liza-1 exploration well at the Stabroek Block. However, now coalition Government, which was in Opposition at the time, had said that the PPP’s announcement was a mere elections gimmick.

K

Govt. and oil companies using tactics to prevent independent analysis of our oil reserves


 

By Kemol King

When oil companies drill wells, they record the details of whatever they find. This practice is called well logging. If citizens had access to these logs, they would be able – with a little expertise – to independently analyse discoveries, and to determine just how much of the discovery is oil, and how much is natural gas.

ExxonMobil operates the Stabroek Block offshore Guyana, which contains most of Guyana’s discovered commercial hydrocarbon reserves

With the knowledge of just how much oil and gas is out there within the boundaries of any particular project, like Liza-One or Payara, the people of Guyana would know just how much wealth they have. But they don’t.
Every time ExxonMobil makes a material discovery, its public disclosures report the estimated quantity of the discovery in barrels of oil equivalent (boe). While that report gives an idea of what is in the well, it doesn’t say how much of the discovery is actually oil, or how much is actually natural gas. ExxonMobil has refused to say. Kaieteur News has posed the question to the oil company’s local subsidiary, Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited (EEPGL), several times late last year, and it said it was still analyzing the contents of those discoveries.
This response would not add up, as the oil company was able to inform the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) last year that between 30 and 50 million cubic feet per day of extra natural gas from the Liza-1 project can be made available for electricity generation in Guyana. Furthermore, the Liza-1 discovery was made almost five years ago.
In comparison, Suriname’s experience is vastly different, whereas Apache and Total were able to make a material discovery in the country’s Block 58, with Wood Mackenzie – a firm independent of both of them – reporting that it estimated 300 million barrels of oil, 150 million barrels of condensate and 1.4 trillion cubic feet of gas in that discovery. This did not take years. It took just a few days.
In trying to determine whether Guyana could have independent analyses done as well, Kaieteur News has hit a wall. ExxonMobil would not release its well logs, for fear that the publication of the content of those logs would hurt its competitive advantages in the Petroleum industry.
The Government would also not release the well logs, as it fears breaking its confidentiality agreements with the oil companies.
Asked whether well logs owned by Government could be accessed by private citizens, Commissioner at the Geology and Mines Commission (GGMC) Newell Dennison told Kaieteur News that they could, via a paid mechanism.
However, the Commissioner qualified his statement, noting that some logs are proprietary and shall not be released to anyone.
Asked which logs are proprietary, Dennison explained that they would include logs covered by agreements still in focus, due to confidentiality agreements.
What that means is that the only logs accessible to the public are those for concessions which were abandoned decades ago by companies like ExxonMobil’s predecessor, Mobil. What it also means is that ExxonMobil’s well logs for its 15 material discoveries on the Stabroek Block will remain secret, unless Government and all of the oil companies operating the Block consent to the release.
Furthermore, it means that private citizens will not be able to independently analyse logs of ExxonMobil’s 15 material discoveries. Whether Guyana is told the exact contents of the hydrocarbon reserves it owns remains at the mercy of ExxonMobil.

K

If we can all set politics aside, these are exciting times ahead in Guyana. I wanted to inquire about who supplies Exxon with their rigging hardware, ie chains, wire ropes, sings, repair and certification of hardware etc etc but don’t where to start. How does one deal with the red tape in Guyana ? 
Excellent thread Gilly. 

FM

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