A regional hub for science and energy technology

Maersk Drilling wins two-well contract for Maersk Developer
Maersk Drilling has entered into a contract with BG International, a subsidiary of Shell, for work offshore Trinidad and Tobago on a two-well development project for the semi-submersible rig Maersk Developer.

Source: Maersk Drilling

The contract has an estimated duration of 171 days and is expected to commence in Q1 2020. The value of the firm contract is approx. USD 39m, including a mobilisation fee. The contract contains five additional one-well options.

The Mærsk Developer is a DSS-21 column-stabilized dynamically positioned semi-submersible rig, able to operate in water depths up to 10,000ft. It is currently operating offshore Mexico.

‘We are very pleased to be headed back to Trinidad to build on the successful work Mærsk Developer previously performed for Shell there,’ says Morten Kelstrup, COO of Maersk Drilling.

DOF Subsea

BERGEN, Norway –    DOF Subsea announced multiple contract awards from undisclosed clients in two growing regions, Trinidad and US GoM.

Skandi Neptune won a 3-year frame agreement for IMR and light construction services with a major operator in Trinidad and will commence operation there late November for the first offshore inspection campaign.

The Group also secured several shorter contracts in the GoM to support IMR, subsea installation and decommissioning operations, securing good utilisation in the fourth quarter for Harvey Deep Sea.

Geosea has been awarded a 21-day contract commencing in late November in the GoM.

Mons Aase, CEO DOF Subsea, said:

‘This is important awards for us, securing good utilisation for our ships in the North America Region, in addition to creating a strong basis for future work in Trinidad and the GoM.’

Source: DOF Subsea

Columbus Energy Resources 
Extension of Inniss Trinity IPSC

Columbus Energy Resources announced the extension of the Inniss Trinity Incremental Production Service Contract (‘IPSC’) to allow for the implementation of the CO2 Pilot Project and to replace the existing minimum work obligations with the CO2 Pilot Project.

Highlights

Extension of the Inniss Trinity IPSC from January 2020 to December 2021
Revision of Minimum Work Obligation to replace the drilling of 7 development wells with the CO2 Pilot Project
Leo Koot, Executive Chairman of Columbus, commented:

‘The Company is pleased to have secured an extension to the Inniss Trinity IPSC to allow for the implementing of the CO2 Pilot Project. We believe the CO2 Pilot Project will give all parties a valuable insight into an alternative enhanced oil recovery mechanism for Trinidad and has the potential to transform oil & gas operations in the Inniss-Trinity field and in similar fields in Trinidad. In recognition of this, implementation of the CO2 Pilot Project will replace the existing Minimum Work Obligation of drilling 7 development wells. We look forward to working with the Ministry, Heritage and Predator to implement the CO2 Pilot Project.’

Background – Inniss Trinity IPSC

Fram Exploration (Trinidad) (‘FRAM’), the operator of the Inniss-Trinity field and a wholly-owned subsidiary of Columbus, is party to the Inniss-Trinity IPSC with Heritage Petroleum Company.

The term of the Inniss Trinity IPSC was due to expire in January 2020. It will now be extended until 31 December 2021 provided the Company implements the first phase of the CO2 Pilot Project by 28 January 2020.

The existing MWO  of the Inniss Trinity is the drilling of 7 development wells. The MWO has been amended to be the implementation of the CO2 Pilot Project.

The Company’s interest in the Inniss-Trinity field benefits from an agreement with Predator Oil and Gas, whereby Predator will help plan and fund a CO2 EOR Pilot Project. As part of agreement with Predator, Predator has the right until to purchase FRAM for US$4.2m. In conjunction with the extension of the Inniss Trinity IPSC and recognising the timeline of the CO2 Pilot Project, the date by which Predator can elect to purchase FRAM has been extended to 30 September 2020 (or 30 June 2020 should the CO2 pilot project not progress beyond its first phase).

Columbus Energy Resources 
Medium-term funding agreement

Columbus, the oil and gas producer and explorer with operations in Trinidad and Suriname, has agreed to terms for a new Convertible Loan Agreement with Lind Global Macro Fund an entity managed by The Lind Partners to provide access to additional funds, should they be required, to:

1. 1. 1. assist with any un-planned additional costs arising from the drilling of the Saffron well in Trinidad;
      2. enable Columbus to fast-track the appraisal and development of the Saffron prospect following any discovery; and
      3. provide the resources to fast-track planned technical and operational activities on the Weg Naar Zee licence in Suriname, including development of the field following the extended well tests.

The Agreement provides Columbus with access to a medium-term funding which is available for drawdown in three separate tranches, the first US$1.5 million tranche being drawn-down immediately with two further US$1.5 million tranches being available for drawdown in future, subject to certain conditions.

The Agreement effectively replaces the facility entered into in 2016 under which Columbus has recently made the final repayment of amounts drawn-down in December 2016 and October 2017. The Company has made total repayments to the Funder under the previous facility of approximately US$3.2 million since January 2017. Apart from two exceptions, all monthly payments were made in cash.

Leo Koot, Executive Chairman of Columbus, commented:

‘The Company is currently drilling the Saffron well, with operations and costs in line with our previous expectations. As with any drilling campaign, it is prudent to have sufficient cash resources to complete the well if the Company encounters unexpected operational delays or unexpected hazards. In addition, Columbus wishes to have the financial flexibility to enable us to move forward with the appraisal and development of a Saffron discovery and speed up our plans in Suriname to unlock the potential of the Weg Naar Zee opportunity we recently announced. The Funding provides the Company with that flexibility and also provides a ‘financial insurance policy’ for the Company going forward.

The Company’s past experience with Lind, who have provided similar facilities in 2016 and 2018, gives us comfort that the Funding is the right way to provide the working capital should it be needed to cover unexpected costs and will also enable Columbus to progress our plans faster than might otherwise be the case, should this make good business sense in 2020 and beyond.

The Company believes that the Funding is value accretive for our shareholders as it minimises equity dilution whilst providing financial flexibility at minimal cost. I am delighted to be able to continue our excellent relationship with Lind who have proved to be a very supportive partner for Columbus over the past few years.

We have not yet decided whether we will draw upon the second and third tranches which are available to us and will keep the market informed of our plans as we progress into 2020. I would stress that the Company remains committed to finding the lowest cost options for appraising and developing its assets and will judge any further drawdown under the Agreement against other options at the time.’

Source: Columbus Energy Resources

BHP estimates 3.5 Tcf off Trinidad

Australian explorer targeting final investment decision for Northern Licences project as soon as 2022, ‘subject on being competitive for capital’

BHP is eyeing a final investment decision as soon as 2022 for a project to develop the gas discoveries made in its northern licences

GAS AUDIT RESULTS FOR THE YEAR END 2018
Natural Gas Reserve audits were previously undertaken by the Ryder Scott Company for and on behalf of the Government of Trinidad and Tobago during the periods 2000 to 2004, 2006 to 2010 and 2011 to 2015. Ryder Scott was engaged on five (5) year contracts and the previous contract ended in 2016. In 2017, Cabinet granted approval for the Ministry to seek an independent petroleum consultant to undertake annual audits of the non-associated gas reserves for the five year period from year-end 2016 to 2020. Following a highly competitive tender process, a team from the Ministry conducted evaluations and selected the Ryder Scott Company from a field of five (5) prestigious international petroleum consultants that tendered bids.

The first two audits of the contract, Year End 2016 and Year End 2017 were completed last year. Year End 2018 is the third audit of the contract…

Links to MEEI Reports 2019

http://www.energy.gov.tt/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Natural-Gas-Reserve-Audit-Summary-Reports-201620172018.pdf

http://www.energy.gov.tt/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Non-Associated-Gas-Reserves-Resources-Certification-Year-End-2018-Presentation.pdf

http://www.energy.gov.tt/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Feature-Address-by-the-Honourable-Minister-of-Energy-and-Energy-Industries-at-the-presentation-of-the-Gas-Audit-Results-for-the-year-end-2018.pdf

http://www.energy.gov.tt/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Presentation-accompanying-the-Feature-Address-by-the-Honourable-Minister-of-Energy-and-Energy-Industries-at-the-Gas-Audit-Results-for-the-year-end-2018.pdf

http://www.energy.gov.tt/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Feature-Address-by-the-Honourable-Minister-of-Energy-and-Energy-Industries-on-the-occasion-of-the-Society-of-Exploration-Geophysicists%E2%80%99-SEG-Workshop-entitled-Advances-in-Marine-Seismic-Technology.pdf

The Ministry of Energy and Energy Industries (MEEI), believes that the leveraging and application of advancing technologies can only be beneficial to our Oil and Gas Sector and by extension, our country. Since 1930, T&T has seen the implementation of geophysical surveys as a means of de-risking our oil and gas prospects. The Ministry, have supported the use of geophysical techniques in the continued development of the sector by approving and regulating the conduct of several shallow and deep marine seismic surveys across the many Blocks.

http://www.energy.gov.tt/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/Feature-Address-by-Senator-the-Honourable-Franklin-Khan-Minister-of-Energy-and-Energy-Industries-at-the-Launch-of-the-Sixth-EITI-Report.pdf

The EITI as the name suggests focuses on transparency and accountability in how a country manages its oil, gas or mineral resources. This initiative is in agreement with the Government’s own principles openness, clarity and honesty. These are words we live by especially, as it relates to the energy sector. The Government of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago’s commitment to transparency is well documented.

http://www.energy.gov.tt/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/Definitive-Agreement-between-the-Government-of-the-Republic-of-Trinidad-and-Tobago-and-Shell-Trinidad-and-Tobago-Limited.pdf

MHTL arranges $1 billion term facility

Methanol Hold­ings (Trinidad) Lim­it­ed (MHTL), a mem­ber of the Pro­man Group of Com­pa­nies, an­nounced the com­ple­tion of a TT $1 bil­lion term fa­cil­i­ty.

The term fa­cil­i­ty bears in­ter­est at a rate of 5.50 per cent per an­num for the first 18 months, has a tenure of three years and is un­se­cured with in­ter­est payable se­mi-an­nu­al­ly. The lead arrangers for this TT$1 bil­lion term fa­cil­i­ty are ANSA Mer­chant Bank Ltd, Sco­tia­bank Trinidad and To­ba­go Ltd and Re­pub­lic Bank Ltd.

The in­au­gur­al TT$1 bil­lion debt is­suance was over­sub­scribed and based on strong lo­cal re­verse in­quiries from a com­bi­na­tion of lo­cal banks, glob­al banks rep­re­sent­ed do­mes­tic and lo­cal as­set man­agers. The pro­ceeds of the fi­nanc­ing will serve the work­ing cap­i­tal and ex­pens­es of the MHTL fa­cil­i­ties in the do­mes­tic Trinida­di­an cur­ren­cy, the com­pa­ny said.

Nel­lo Ramkissoon, Fi­nance Di­rec­tor said, “We are ex­treme­ly pleased to have se­cured this new term fa­cil­i­ty. Sev­er­al lead­ing banks and as­set man­agers have ap­proached us to is­sue lo­cal debt to serve our op­er­a­tional ex­pens­es and we are over­whelmed by the de­mand and the trust that they have demon­strat­ed in our com­pa­ny and op­er­a­tions.”

The lev­el of in­ter­est se­cured by the com­pa­ny is tes­timonyt to the strength of MHTL’s rep­u­ta­tion in T&T and glob­al­ly as a leader in the methanol in­dus­try.

Act­ing Chief Ex­ec­u­tive of MHTL and man­ag­ing di­rec­tor of Pro­man Trinidad Claus Cron­berg­er said, “With this in­au­gur­al lo­cal Trinida­di­an debt is­suance we have fur­ther so­lid­i­fied Pro­man’s po­si­tion as one of the pre­mier en­er­gy com­pa­nies in T&T with strong lo­cal in­ter­ests.

MHTL con­tin­ues to be the core op­er­a­tional as­set for the Pro­man fam­i­ly of com­pa­nies and we re­main fo­cused on de­liv­er­ing world class methanol and fer­tilis­er prod­ucts from our di­ver­si­fied as­set base in the Point Lisas In­dus­tri­al Es­tate where we re­main a sig­nif­i­cant em­ploy­er of lo­cal tal­ent with over 1,500 lo­cal em­ploy­ees.”

Man­ag­ing di­rec­tor of ANSA Mer­chant Bank Ltd Gre­go­ry Hill, de­scribed the move as a land­mark en­er­gy sec­tor trans­ac­tion which demon­strat­ed the on-go­ing growth and de­vel­op­ment of its cap­i­tal mar­kets. “It af­ford­ed MHTL and Pro­man the op­por­tu­ni­ty to in­crease its lo­cal con­tent now via the do­mes­tic fi­nan­cial and cap­i­tal mar­kets.”

MHTL is one of the largest methanol pro­duc­ers in the world with a to­tal ca­pac­i­ty of over four mil­lion met­ric tons an­nu­al­ly and 1.5 mil­lion met­ric tonnes of fer­tilis­er prod­ucts, from its five methanol plants lo­cat­ed at the Point Lisas In­dus­tri­al Es­tate. The com­pa­ny is the largest sup­pli­er of methanol to North Amer­i­ca and is al­so a sig­nif­i­cant sup­pli­er to the Eu­ro­pean Mar­ket.

Heritage

One year af­ter it was es­tab­lished, Her­itage Pe­tro­le­um record­ed net prof­it of $725 mil­lion.    The Prime Min­is­ter felt vin­di­cat­ed by Gov­ern­ment ac­tion when pre­vi­ous ad­min­is­tra­tions mis­rep­re­sent­ed Petrotrin’s woes.

En­er­gy and En­er­gy In­dus­tries Min­is­ter Franklin Khan re­vealed Her­itage fi­nan­cial fig­ures dur­ing Con­ver­sa­tion with the Prime Min­is­ter in Pa­lo Seco. The unau­dit­ed fi­nan­cial state­ment for the 2019 fis­cal year end­ing Sep­tem­ber 31 showed rev­enue for the first three quar­ters was $3.2 bil­lion and the en­tire year was $5.4 bil­lion.

“For the fis­cal year 2019, Her­itage has made a prof­it of $725 mil­lion and that is af­ter-tax prof­it, which means Her­itage is the com­pa­ny that is pay­ing off the Petrotrin debt. So that is prof­it af­ter we have ser­viced our $30 mil­lion debt.”
On No­vem­ber 30, 2018, clo­sure of Petrotrin axed over 5000 employees.. Once the na­tion’s cash cow, Petrotrin was laden with debt, un­able to ser­vice its loans and strug­gled to fi­nance up­grades and pay­ments to Gov­ern­ment.

Row­ley said that when the Gov­ern­ment took ac­tion peo­ple ap­point­ed them­selves de­fend­ers of the pub­lic in­ter­est.

T&T’s his­to­ry in oil and gas showed that re­struc­tur­ing was al­ways done to suit eco­nom­ic needs. If Petrotrin was left as it is, the coun­try would lose $2 bil­lion per year.   He had to tell the Oil­fields Work­ers’ Trade Union that to fix T&T’s oil busi­ness, the re­fin­ery had to be closed. Im­port­ing 100,000 bar­rels of oil per day and los­ing US$7 on each bar­rel, he im­plored them to do the maths.

When he told the Union that Petrotrin could no longer sus­tain the re­fin­ery op­er­a­tions, their re­sponse was “when is the next ne­go­ti­a­tion start­ing.” While the OW­TU main­tains that it got no favours from the Gov­ern­ment in ac­quir­ing the Guaracara Re­fin­ing Com­pa­ny, Row­ley said they got a $700 mil­lion help in terms of a mora­to­ri­um on pay­ment. Gov­ern­ment re­alised that there would be a sig­nif­i­cant cost in restart­ing the re­fin­ery.

While the clo­sure af­fect­ed the econ­o­my and lives in South Trinidad, Khan said for a com­pa­ny to car­ry out its Cor­po­rate So­cial Re­spon­si­bil­i­ty pro­gramme, it must make mon­ey. Now that Her­itage is gen­er­at­ing rev­enue, the com­pa­ny CSR plan has start­ed with a launch two weeks ago. Un­em­ploy­ment and un­der­em­ploy­ment were dis­cussed, es­pe­cial­ly since Petrotrin’s clo­sure left thou­sands job­less.

The plan was to em­ploy 800 peo­ple at Her­itage where 300 peo­ple are cur­rent­ly em­ployed, 100 con­tract work­ers and an es­ti­mat­ed 400 em­ploy­ees sup­plied by third-par­ty con­trac­tors.
“What we want to do is not have this pro­lif­er­a­tion of con­tract work­ers be­cause we promised you sus­tain­able jobs with the se­cu­ri­ty of tenure. And as the months go by, prob­a­bly by June, in the lat­ter part of next year, Her­itage’s di­rect em­ployed will grow by at least 67.

“Her­itage is in a much bet­ter place. And once Her­itage con­tin­ues to be prof­itable, we can spread out fur­ther in the com­mu­ni­ty. All these fa­cil­i­ties that were man­aged by Petrotrin… all of them will be restart­ed,” Khan said.

However, politics still lie at the heart of the sale of the refinery, now dead in the water.

Bright future for energy with Heritage
Khan says the fu­ture of the en­er­gy sec­tor un­der Her­itage Pe­tro­le­um Com­pa­ny Lim­it­ed is bright. In Fyz­abad, Khan said change in the oil in­dus­try is noth­ing new. Cab­i­net made the harsh de­ci­sion to re­struc­ture Petrotrin be­cause it was haem­or­rhag­ing mon­ey, its op­er­at­ing costs were high and pro­duc­tion was de­creas­ing.

De­clar­ing that Her­itage was do­ing well, Khan added: “The fu­ture of the oil sec­tor lies square­ly on the legs of Her­itage.”

The com­pa­ny pro­duced 38,900 bar­rels of oil due to ramped up ac­tiv­i­ty. Giv­ing a broad­er pic­ture of what is hap­pen­ing in the sec­tor, Khan said there were 19 lease op­er­a­tors and farm-out own­ers, most of them lo­cal en­ti­ties. In the first three quar­ters, Her­itage op­er­at­ed the com­pa­ny and gen­er­at­ed $3.287 bil­lion in rev­enue and its debt ser­vic­ing was $543 mil­lion.

Petrotrin’s debt and loans will be paid al­most en­tire­ly from the cash flow of Her­itage. Crude oil is sell­ing and mak­ing mon­ey at a pre­mi­um price on the in­ter­na­tion­al mar­ket. In about six months, 800 peo­ple will be di­rect­ly em­ployed with Her­itage, he said.

Heritage launches CSR programmes
As mature oil­fields decline, Khan says Her­itage Pe­tro­le­um has to find new de­posits to sur­vive.

Her­itage pro­duces an av­er­age of 38,500 bpd, a drop in the bar­rel com­pared to its pre­de­ces­sors and in­ter­na­tion­al com­peti­tors.

Trin­mar alone once pro­duced 40,000 bpd. Hav­ing as­sessed and an­a­lyzed the econ­o­my, T&T still de­pends heav­i­ly on oil and gas sales. De­spite the chal­lenge, Her­itage launched its Cor­po­rate So­cial Re­spon­si­bil­i­ty ini­tia­tive at its San­ta Flo­ra head of­fice with plans to spend mil­lions in com­mu­ni­ty and hu­man de­vel­op­ment pro­grammes.

“Oil and gas ex­plo­ration is a com­plex sci­ence. These oil fields are old… very old. We have been pro­duc­ing oil for over 100 years now.. Pa­lo Seco field, the Fyz­abad field, For­est Re­serve field, Point Fortin, Cen­tral FC, MPW.. all dis­cov­ered in the 1910s, 20s and 30s. Cu­mu­la­tive­ly, they have pro­duced over a bil­lion and a half bar­rels of oil, but they are com­ing to the end of their lives. We have come to a stage now where we have to find new oil on­shore, pos­si­bly in Trin­mar in the Gulf of Paria. The en­tire en­er­gy sec­tor has mi­grat­ed to the North East­ern/East coast of Trinidad and To­ba­go; they have left us be­hind. So it is now the role of the ‘ex­plo­rationist’, my­self in­clud­ed, ge­ol­o­gist, geo­physi­cists to come up with new ideas and new con­cepts as to how we can con­tin­ue to search for new oil fields in on­shore Trinidad and in par­tic­u­lar, the Gulf of Paria,” Khan said.

Look­ing to Guyana, he said nev­er be­fore in his ca­reer in the en­er­gy sec­tor has he seen so much oil be­ing found in a coun­try in such a short time. There were more re­serves per capi­ta than Sau­di Ara­bia, bear­ing in mind their 750, 000 pop­u­la­tion. T&T can cap­i­tal­ize on this with its hu­man re­source ex­per­tise in the sec­tor. A home base must be es­tab­lished by in­creas­ing pro­duc­tion, im­prov­ing ef­fi­cien­cy and find­ing new de­posits, which the Her­itage tech­ni­cal staff has been man­dat­ed to do.

With Petrotrin’s clo­sure af­fect­ing the economies of com­mu­ni­ties along the South West­ern Penin­su­la, he said Her­itage’s suc­cess is fun­da­men­tal to their long term sur­vival.

“Be­cause what else do you have in this part of the coun­try out­side of oil? Noth­ing else has emerged as yet so you have to pro­tect this in­dus­try.” There­fore, he urged thieves to stop steal­ing the com­pa­ny’s equip­ment as it some­times stalls pro­duc­tion.

While Petrotrin squandered funds on spon­sor­ship pro­grammes, CSR will now be fo­cused on de­vel­op­ing cit­i­zens’ skill sets.

Her­itage CEO Ar­lene Chow said while the com­pa­ny fo­cus on prof­itabil­i­ty and op­er­a­tional suc­cess, it must do good at the same time. The aim is to cre­ate mea­sur­able im­prove­ments that would bring sus­tain­able growth to Her­itage’s fence line com­mu­ni­ties. The com­pa­nies CSR plan was de­rived from fo­cus groups with em­ploy­ees and the com­mu­ni­ties.—Kevon Felmine

On complaints by the UNC-controlled Siparia and Penal/ Debe Regional Corporations over the lack of funds, he said “The appropriation bill was passed, everybody got their funds, everybody was happy with their funds, so that they are just crying wolf to make it sound like a political event. But the allocations have been evenly distributed throughout the corporations , both PNM and UNC.” Yet these oil producers are neglected annually during floods and the homeless are seeking shelter in wetlands.

“Conspiracy”   between PNM, OWTU in refinery bid

THE PEOPLE’s National Movement (PNM) denies any conspiracy between the party and the Oilfield Workers Trade Union (OWTU) over the union’s bid to run the former Petrotrin refinery.

The Prime Minister dismissed the theory of a conspiracy in Siparia, one of the constituencies in the oil belt..

The process through which OWTU’s wholly-owned company Patriotric Energies and Technologies Ltd (PET) secured the bid “was transparent, deliberate and very extensive.”  Of all the expressions of interest the OWTU had the best proposal.

While the union and his government did not always see eye to eye, there was mutual respect and he could work with the union.

“I could argue with Roget (OWTU’s president Ancel Roget). But… I respect them, and I could work with them. That is what it is all about, because they have their interest and I have my responsibility.”

When he first offered the union the opportunity to run the refinery, he told them to ensure their proposal was robust and could stand scrutiny and he maintained that position.

“If workers, through unions, are interested in going into the business of refining and the refinery is available, give them the first opportunity, because we are building a new society in TT. If the union wants to get involved in business, then count on the PNM.”

Rowley told the audience, which included his colleagues Franklin Khan and Robert Le Hunte, who both lived in Fyzabad, “From day one we said we would love to have the refinery restarted, but not as a taxpayer entity, because the taxpayer is not in a position to buy oil, bring it here to refine and lose between US$3 to $7 (on a barrel of oil per day).

“I want to tell the OWTU, as long as your proposal is robust, as long as your proposal can stand business scrutiny, you can count on the government of TT to work alongside you to get it done. Because in these battles, in this fight for nationalism, in this fight for survival and sustainability, we are all in this together.”

He could visualise the OWTU leadership “moving from pounding pavements and shouting across the streets to being in the boardroom and taking serious decisions about serious investments that could make their members seriously rich.”

PET will have to do two things. One, find an appropriate financier and, a crude oil supplier as the refinery will need oil to operate. An appropriate financier does not mean the OWTU must have cash in hand, but having been selected by the government gives them the edge in attracting finances.

Noting talk that Roget cannot run a refinery, he said if the requisite skills do not reside within the union, it could go into the market and hire the skills.

“We are waiting to see what the union comes to us with, and it is in everybody’s interest in this country to succeed in what they are engaged in. Whether Gasparillo, Marabella, San Fernando, Fyzabad or Scarborough, it is in your interest, and the government would do everything that is reasonable to make them succeed, if they are serious.”

Pa­tri­ot­ic Team met the Eval­u­a­tion Com­mit­tee and put for­ward the ten spe­cif­ic ar­eas of re­quire­ment which they were asked to de­liv­er with­in a month af­ter their bid for the re­fin­ery was ac­cept­ed. While they await the out­come , Row­ley said, “It is in every­body’s in­ter­est in this coun­try that they suc­ceed in what they are en­gaged in, whether it Gas­par­il­lo, Mara­bel­la, San Fer­nan­do, Fyz­abad or Scar­bor­ough. It is in our in­ter­est and the gov­ern­ment will do every­thing that is rea­son­able to make them suc­ceed if they are se­ri­ous.”

Row­ley re­it­er­at­ed that Petrotrin was not shut down but was re­struc­tured be­cause it was los­ing mon­ey, pro­duc­tion was de­creas­ing and was in too much debt.

Patriotic closer to acquiring refinery
Pa­tri­ot­ic En­er­gies and Tech­nolo­gies Co. Ltd took an­oth­er step to­ward ac­quir­ing the Guaracara Re­fin­ing Com­pa­ny and the Paria Fu­el Trad­ing Com­pa­ny when it pre­sent­ed its re­sponse to re­quire­ments giv­en by the eval­u­a­tion com­mit­tee over­see­ing the sale.

The oilields Work­ers’ Trade Union (OW­TU) said the en­tire Pa­tri­ot­ic team/con­sor­tium met the com­mit­tee and de­liv­ered on all the re­quire­ments, thus meet­ing its dead­line.
“… the union now awaits a re­sponse from the eval­u­a­tion com­mit­tee on or be­fore the end of the month. The OW­TU is con­fi­dent that its com­pa­ny, Pa­tri­ot­ic, stands ready to move to the next stage of ful­ly com­plet­ing the ac­qui­si­tion process in a time­ly man­ner for the ben­e­fit of all cit­i­zens of Trinidad and To­ba­go,” the union said.

Pa­tri­ot­ic hopes to be­gin an over­haul of the oil as­sets be­fore the year ends so that op­er­a­tions can be­gin in ear­ly 2020.   The ac­qui­si­tion fol­lows clo­sure of Petrotrin in No­vem­ber 2018 and ter­mi­na­tion of 4700 staff. This was fol­lowed by protest and le­gal ac­tion by the OW­TU. When all failed, the union in­cor­po­rat­ed Pa­tri­ot­ic to bid for the Re­fin­ery, stor­age, pro­cess­ing and port fa­cil­i­ties.

On Sep­tem­ber 20, the Fi­nance Min­is­ter told Par­lia­ment that Pa­tri­ot­ic was the pre­ferred bid­der, beat­ing in­ter­na­tion­al com­peti­tors.

Two for­mer UNC sen­a­tors ap­plied an in­junc­tion to stop the sale of the re­fin­ery, pend­ing the out­come of a ju­di­cial re­view. The law­suit was filed to de­ter­mine whether the chair­man of the Joint Se­lect Com­mit­tee on En­er­gy Colm Im­bert had act­ed im­prop­er­ly by not con­ven­ing a meet­ing where the sale of the State’s as­set could be scru­ti­nised. The ap­pli­ca­tion was with­drawn when Im­bert sched­uled a meet­ing. How­ev­er, the court is be­ing asked to re­view Im­bert’s con­duct.

PET Co Ltd is a new company with no track record. Repeating that the acquisition is for the benefit of the citizens of Trinidad and Tobago, implies they expect taxpayers to bank-roll them again. They have a history of demanding inflated wages , regular days of R&R, overtime, strikes, holding the public to ransom for petroleum products, ousting investors and dependence on the taxpayers. It contributed to the original company going bankrupt to the point of nearly bankrupting the country.  New leadership in 2020 can loosen their grip on the sector and push wide-ranging reforms.

BP Trinidad and Tobago (BPTT)

Interview: Claire Fitzpatrick

CLAIRE FITZPATRICK: After the acquisition of two deepwater blocks, BP has reduced its stake in them to 30%, with BHP taking on the role of operator. We went after this acreage because we saw its potential, and the fact that we have retained a stake underlies our continued belief in the project.

The BP group has leaders throughout various regions with significant experience in deepwater exploration and development, and that expertise has been extended to T&T.

Interviewer: What role do marginal and cross-border fields play in the production of oil and gas, and what is the status of the Manakin-Cocuina field?

FITZPATRICK: Resources that sit within and beyond our borders are very strategic for future exploration and maintaining our existing production profile. Marginal fields are defined as those which struggle to be competitive economically. Within this, small pools in the existing fields are characterised as those holding resources of less than 50bn cu feet. Currently, this portfolio has a high development cost. Having said that, we believe there are significant benefits in going after these smaller pools, and that they make up an important component of our future development plans.

In addition, we are looking at how technology can be used to support access to small pools in an economically competitive way.

Cross-border field activity involves cooperation between the state and private entities, and also between federal governments. The former is essential, and BPTT has maintained a healthy relationship with the government across various administrations. Until now this partnership has focused on issues related to the development of our Columbus Basin.

We have yet to develop the Manakin-Cocuina gas field located on the Venezuela border, but I am confident that there is already a strong relationship between the two countries, which are working together to determine the best development strategies and options for managing cross-border resources. The focus at present is on obtaining the necessary intergovernmental agreements in order to move forward with the correct strategy for the development of these resources.

Interviewer: To what extent will new discoveries revive the oil and gas industry in T&T, and how are technological advancements changing the industry?

FITZPATRICK: Commercial discoveries are exciting for the industry, but they should not be taken as the only indicator of the state of the energy sector; levels of activity and investment are also good markers. There is a saying in the industry that “big fields get bigger”, and extending the development of existing fields has already brought significant new activity to the country.

The success of exploration efforts only happens after important investment decisions are undertaken, extensive seismic and processing data collected, and initial drilling carried out. There is, however, a significant amount of activity already under way in the local energy sector to locate these resources and bring them to production. Technology will also play an important role in helping us to recover and discover more resources.

Technology is forcing the industry to rethink the ways in which companies conduct their businesses, and to harness the power of their employees and data. I have previously mentioned that even traditional positions are changing from those I was familiar with when I initially entered the industry. The outcome of this is that we are now witnessing a sector that is constantly changing and evolving.

BP Trinidad & To­ba­go –  Off­shore  gas dis­cov­ery at Gin­ger ex­plo­ration well 

The well was ex­pect­ed to be com­plet­ed by the end of No­vem­ber 2019 and re­sults will con­tin­ue to be eval­u­at­ed fol­low­ing the com­ple­tion of drilling op­er­a­tions, but ini­tial re­sults are promis­ing.

The Gin­ger ex­plo­ration well was drilled in­to two untest­ed fault blocks east of the Cashima Field in wa­ter depths less than 300 feet, ap­prox­i­mate­ly 50 miles off the south-east coast of Trinidad.

Drilled us­ing a jack­up rig the well pen­e­trat­ed hy­dro­car­bon-bear­ing reser­voirs in fif­teen seg­ments.

“This is pos­i­tive news for both BPTT and the in­dus­try, as these dis­cov­er­ies con­tin­ue BPTT’s ex­plo­ration suc­cess on the Trinidad shelf fol­low­ing the Sa­van­nah and Macadamia com­mer­cial dis­cov­er­ies,” Claire Fitz­patrick, Re­gion­al Pres­i­dent for BPTT said.

“We are con­tin­u­ing to see the ben­e­fits of the sig­nif­i­cant in­vest­ment we have made in seis­mic pro­cess­ing and Ocean Bot­tom Seis­mic ac­qui­si­tion. The Colum­bus Basin is a ma­tur­ing province and the Gin­ger dis­cov­ery demon­strates that with the right tech­nol­o­gy we can con­tin­ue to un­cov­er fur­ther re­source po­ten­tial in the basin. This demon­strates our on­go­ing com­mit­ment to the de­vel­op­ment of our  Trinidad and To­ba­go op­er­a­tions and the wider in­dus­try,”Fitz­patrick added.

BP T&T has a 100 per cent work­ing in­ter­est in Gin­ger.

BPTT op­er­ates off Trinidad’s east coast and has 15 off­shore plat­forms and two on­shore pro­cess­ing fa­cil­i­ties. BPTT is 70 per cent owned by BP and 30 per cent owned by Rep­sol.

Private companies ramp up exploration

While SOC Petrotrin announced in 2018 that it would finalise plans to restructure its operations in order to increase efficiency, moderate losses and ramp up oil and gas production, as of early September 2018 the process had yet to take shape. Petrotrin faced strong opposition from the Oilfield Workers’ Trade Union (OWTU), which said that the restructuring plans could put 2500 employees out of a job.

Increased exploration activities offer opportunities for private investment and further development of the sector. The upcoming upstream projects by local and foreign companies are expected to boost oil production, which has stagnated since the 2014 global oil price shock.

One of the restructuring options is the intervention of private capital. The minister of energy , in June 2018 said that, while the national oil company requires change, the government is not in a position to provide the capital needed to upgrade ageing assets to increase production. As of August 2018 Petrotrin produced over 40,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil, which accounted for around 60% of the country’s total oil output. However, output is declining due to limited exploration activities as a result of the company’s financial constraints, and restructuring will be entirely decided by its board of directors.
The government’s hands-off approach was praised by the Energy Chamber of Trinidad and Tobago. President Thackwray Driver said that given the lack of public finances to improve the company’s operations, Petrotrin could look towards the private sector for investment. “We think the government is taking the right approach by empowering the board to make those changes.” Options to consider include farm-out programmes, through which the firm would award blocks to private players on a shared revenue or royalty basis; joint ventures, through which Petrotrin would share revenues with a partner; and listing portions of the company on the T&T Stock Exchange to raise capital.

NIHERST, Shell sign new contract to promote STEM education

The STEM programme received an added boost with the recent signing of a three-year contract between the National Institute for Higher Education, Research, Science and Technology (NIHERST) and Shell Trinidad and Tobago Limited (STTL).

Under the terms, NIHERST will manage Shell’s STEM centres and its STEM Bus programme. Shell will also continue its sponsorship of the FIRST® LEGO® League competition and part sponsorship of NIHERST’s Sci-TechKnoFest, a popular science exhibition and festival.

At the signing ceremony, Shell’s External Relations Advisor, Leslie Bowrin said: “For the past seven years, Shell has been helping to create effective learning environments where our young people can develop those important critical thinking and problem-solving skills to prepare them to take up the leadership roles of the future. We want our students to not feel they are somehow limited in their ability to grasp the theories and concepts of Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics.”

Shell STEM centres are located in Port of Spain and San Fernando. They stimulate interest in and support the STEM curriculum being taught in schools while giving young people the tools and skills to find STEM-based solutions to problems. The programme is comprised of a series of workshops, exercises, and help with coursework. Target ages range from early childhood education to primary and secondary schools.

The Shell STEM Bus takes the programme to remote areas for those who find it difficult to participate. The success of these initiatives will be realised through a measurable increase in the interest and adoption of STEM subjects by participating students. Shell supports STEM in over 20 countries, including India, Australia, Kazakhstan and China.

NIHERST agreed to manage and administer these programmes, relying on its expertise in the area of STEM education. The organisation sees its selection as evidence of the great confidence its long-standing partner placed in its abilities.

Shell’s sponsorship of the 2019–2020 season of the FIRST® LEGO® League (FLL) secondary school competition and the upcoming NIHERST Sci-TechKnoFest mega science festival, the first exhibition of its kind in the Caribbean, will allow NIHERST to bring these much-anticipated events to Trinidad and Tobago again.

Theme of the 2019–2020 FLL is CITY SHAPER. It will challenge participants to build a better world by exploring science and art to provide sustainable solutions to city development. The Trinidad and Tobago leg of the competition was launched and teams are registering.

NIHERST, Shell, the Ministry of Education and other stakeholders are in the early planning stages of Sci-TechKnoFest.

The partnership between NIHERST and Shell will allow both organisations to achieve certain educational and developmental goals. NIHERST will continue to pursue its mandate to promote the development of science, technology and higher education in Trinidad and Tobago, and enhance the innovative, creative and entrepreneurial capabilities of the general population. Professor Emeritus Winston Mellowes, Chairman, during his speech noted that “A scientifically literate population is curious, eager to learn, and open to fresh perspectives, ideas and that acts as a precursor to economic diversification and transformation of society.”

The partnership with Shell aligns well with NIHERST’s renewed strategic focus. The organisation recently made two appointments to its executive team: Vice President of Science and Technology, Mr. Roopchand Raghunanan and President of the Institute, Mrs. Marleen Lord-Lewis. The executive leadership team, working with management and staff, have directed their attention to the development of insightful action plans, analysis and research to deliver the greatest impact and reach for its programmes and events.

NIHERST is grateful to the the Ministry for their vision, support and encouragement.

$7 million for climate change projects

Gov­ern­ment re­ceived ap­prox­i­mate­ly TT$7 mil­lion from international taxpayers supporting the Green Cli­mate Fund (GCF) of the Unit­ed Na­tions for de­vel­op­ment of trans­for­ma­tion­al projects to re­spond to is­sues re­lat­ed to cli­mate change.
The Min­istry of Plan­ning and De­vel­op­ment will be the na­tion­al­ly des­ig­nat­ed au­thor­i­ty for the fund­ing and is the of­fi­cial fo­cal point of the GCF. The Green Cli­mate Fund was es­tab­lished to lim­it or re­duce green­house gas (GHG) emis­sions in de­vel­op­ing coun­tries, and to help vul­ner­a­ble so­ci­eties adapt to the un­avoid­able im­pacts of cli­mate change.

This fund­ing will as­sist the cli­mate change mit­i­ga­tion and adap­ta­tion ef­forts of the Gov­ern­ment through the fo­cus of two ini­tia­tives which pri­mar­i­ly in­volve ca­pac­i­ty build­ing and da­ta col­lec­tion. The in­ten­tion is to re­quest ad­di­tion­al fund­ing from GCF to fur­ther meet r Na­tion­al­ly De­ter­mined Con­tri­bu­tions for on the ground ac­tiv­i­ties to con­tin­ue to re­duce r green­house gas emis­sions and build our re­silience to cli­mate change in all vul­ner­a­ble sec­tors. The spe­cif­ic projects for this fund­ing are:

1. Ca­pac­i­ty build­ing with­in the Min­istry of Plan­ning in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Caribbean Com­mu­ni­ty Cli­mate Change Cen­tre (CC­C­CC) to strength­en the Min­istry’s in­sti­tu­tion­al and tech­ni­cal ca­pa­bil­i­ty to un­der­take GCF fund­ed projects. Oth­er ac­tiv­i­ties will in­clude the de­vel­op­ment of a com­mu­ni­ca­tion and ac­tion plan for stake­hold­ers; re­vi­sion of the Na­tion­al Cli­mate Change Pol­i­cy; and cost ben­e­fit analy­ses of risk and adap­ta­tion mea­sures to en­sure that na­tion­al pro­grams and fund­ed projects ef­fec­tive­ly re­spond to the adap­ta­tion and mit­i­ga­tion needs of T&T.

2. The sec­ond ini­tia­tive is an 18 month col­lab­o­ra­tion with the Food and Agri­cul­tur­al Or­ga­ni­za­tion (FAO) fo­cus­ing on build­ing cli­mate change re­silience in the agri­cul­tur­al sec­tor through the col­lec­tion and analy­sis of agri­cul­tur­al and as­so­ci­at­ed ac­tiv­i­ty da­ta that in­cludes food im­port de­pen­den­cy; the im­pact of hy­dro­log­i­cal and me­te­o­ro­log­i­cal da­ta; as­sess­ment of green­house gas emis­sions and the re­port­ing of gen­der sen­si­tive cli­mate im­pacts on agri­cul­ture and food sys­tems.

This arm of the project will al­so build the ca­pac­i­ty of key stake­hold­ers to use agri­cul­tur­al, hy­dro­log­i­cal and me­te­o­ro­log­i­cal da­ta to im­prove re­silience to cli­mate change, through the de­vel­op­ment of mo­bile phone ap­pli­ca­tions as one tool. The use of this fund­ing is in keep­ing with T&T’s Na­tion­al De­vel­op­ment Strat­e­gy, VI­SION 2030, Theme 5: Plac­ing the En­vi­ron­ment at the Cen­tre of So­cial and Eco­nom­ic De­vel­op­ment as well as with the Gov­ern­ment’s com­mit­ment to achieve the glob­al Sus­tain­able De­vel­op­ment Goals fo­cus­ing on cli­mate change and the en­vi­ron­ment.

Refusal of IMF funding

Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert told the CAF Sem­i­nar on “En­vi­sion­ing Long Term Sus­tain­abil­i­ty in T&T”  that T&T is for­tu­nate to be a full mem­ber of the De­vel­op­ment Bank of Latin Amer­i­ca (CAF) as its ap­proach is a breath of fresh air com­pared to that of oth­er mul­ti-lat­er­al lend­ing in­sti­tu­tions.

“I re­al­ly have ap­pre­ci­at­ed their ap­proach to fi­nanc­ing in­fra­struc­ture, pol­i­cy, and fis­cal con­sol­i­da­tion in T&T. It has been a breath of fresh air when com­pared to oth­er de­vel­op­men­tal banks.”

This sem­i­nar or­gan­ised on the 50th an­niver­sary of CAF, will ad­dress long term de­vel­op­men­tal chal­lenges with the par­tic­i­pa­tion of speak­ers from acad­e­mia, the Gov­ern­ment, in­ter­na­tion­al or­gan­i­sa­tions and the pri­vate sec­tor. T&T does not wish to re­turn to the In­ter­na­tion­al Mon­e­tary Fund (IMF) which bailed out the coun­try but on terms that hurt the gen­er­al pop­u­la­tion.

“Blind ad­her­ence to this se­vere mod­el of struc­tur­al ad­just­ment at the ex­pense of our hu­man cap­i­tal was not a road that we wished to trav­el again. While learn­ing the lessons from the past, we fo­cus on our fu­ture and care­ful­ly re­viewed all of these pro­pos­als. In 2015, T&T’s econ­o­my was in an even more per­ilous state than the new Gov­ern­ment ini­tial­ly en­vis­aged. Al­though, the econ­o­my was ba­si­cal­ly flat over the 2010 to 2015 pe­ri­od with just a two per cent over­all in­crease in re­al Gross Do­mes­tic Prod­uct (GDP) over that pe­ri­od, the pre­vi­ous Gov­ern­ment had grown Gov­ern­ment ex­pen­di­ture to un­sus­tain­able lev­els from TT$46 bil­lion in 2010 to TT$63 in 2014, an in­crease of 37 per cent. Even be­fore the 2015 elec­tion, we had rea­son to be­lieve that T&T’s econ­o­my de­te­ri­o­rat­ed.”

In­de­pen­dent com­men­ta­tors in­clud­ing in­ter­na­tion­al rat­ing agen­cies were of a sim­i­lar view.

“When we were able to es­tab­lish the re­al­i­ty, we had to bal­ance the need to en­sure that the econ­o­my had suf­fi­cient stim­u­lus for re­cov­ery with the need for re­duc­ing ex­pen­di­ture and restor­ing dis­ci­pline in a medi­um-term fis­cal frame­work. This was par­tic­u­lar­ly dif­fi­cult in the con­text of de­pressed com­mod­i­ty prices. But we chose not to re­turn to the In­ter­na­tion­al Mon­e­tary Fund (IMF) for as­sis­tance. We have had enough of that. We chose a dif­fer­ent path.”

The next step was to re­duce Gov­ern­ment ex­pen­di­ture to “man­age­able” lev­els.

“From TT$63 bil­lion to TT$52 bil­lion in the first year and even­tu­al­ly down to $50 bil­lion by 2018. It may sound face­tious but we were able to do this by cut­ting out waste, mis­man­age­ment and in­flat­ed costs known in some quar­ters as cor­rup­tion.”

He jus­ti­fied the clo­sure of SOC Petrotrin as it was a “mon­ey los­er” and the re­struc­ture of Caribbean Air­lines.

Both led to the state sav­ing mon­ey. The econ­o­my has been de­pen­dent on en­er­gy for al­most half-cen­tu­ry and it takes a long while to di­ver­si­fy the econ­o­my for which T&T is mak­ing the ef­fort.

“Buzz words like the blue econ­o­my, the green econ­o­my, and the sil­ver econ­o­my sound nice, but these trans­for­ma­tions can­not be achieved overnight. The econ­o­my of T&T has been chang­ing and in 2019 the min­ing sec­tor and the pe­tro­le­um prod­uct sec­tor which are the core ar­eas of T&T’s en­er­gy sec­tor make up just 28 per­cent of the econ­o­my. The oth­er 72 per­cent is made up of the non-oil, man­u­fac­tur­ing and a range of non-oil ser­vices which has helped us to weath­er the storm cre­at­ed by the col­lapse of oil prices. Eleven years ago in 2008, the pe­tro­le­um sec­tor made up 50 per­cent of T&T’s econ­o­my. There has been a sig­nif­i­cant shift away for ab­solute de­pen­dence on oil and gas,”

$50m for Pigeon Point

Works Min­is­ter Ro­han Sinanan told the Latin Amer­i­ca and Caribbean De­vel­op­men­tal Bank (CAF) Con­fer­ence  that his Min­istry is play­ing its part in de­vel­op­ing the blue econ­o­my, ty­ing ma­rine re­sources to the econ­o­my of the coun­try.

“We take the blue econ­o­my very se­ri­ous­ly as 15 to 20 years down the road if we do not deal with the coastal ar­eas and flood­ing, we will have a ma­jor prob­lem in the coun­try.”

He out­lined the spe­cif­ic projects that the Min­istry is un­der­tak­ing in this area.

“In the Vi­sion 2030 doc­u­ment, goal three and goal five, the Min­istry of Works had sig­nif­i­cant in­put. Goal three deals with cli­mate vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty and Goal five with, max­imis­ing our nat­ur­al re­sources. These two ar­eas fall in­to the en­vi­ron­ment. Com­ing in­to the min­istry and sit­ting with the staff, we recog­nise that the ma­jor chal­lenge fac­ing this coun­try in terms of the in­fra­struc­ture has been cli­mate change, and what is hap­pen­ing with the weath­er pat­tern is flood­ing and coastal ero­sion. We iden­ti­fied those two ar­eas as the two most crit­i­cal ar­eas fac­ing the coun­try. This min­istry deals with the in­fra­struc­ture… the high­ways and walkovers and we have sev­er­al projects. When we saw what was hap­pen­ing with coastal ero­sion …, we recog­nise that some­thing had to be done …”

De­spite the con­tro­ver­sy over whether glob­al warm­ing is a re­al threat, Sinanan said that Gov­ern­ment’s po­si­tion is that it is a re­al threat.

“In terms of the flood­ing prob­lems, what we saw in the last cou­ple of years was in­ten­si­fied flood­ing and it con­tin­ues. Some peo­ple feel it is not glob­al warm­ing. But we feel there is a dras­tic change in weath­er pat­terns. What we have seen in T&T as a small is­land is that in ar­eas where flood­ing nev­er oc­curred, now we have sig­nif­i­cant flood­ing hap­pen­ing. That wa­ter has to get down to the ocean and it is help­ing with the de­struc­tion of the coastal ar­eas.

“To com­bat this, we de­signed a coastal pro­gramme, and took in­to con­sid­er­a­tion a study of the en­tire coast. Where we have to tie that in with we can pro­tect the en­vi­ron­ment and coast­lines but at the same time we have to use the ben­e­fit of that to as­sist the Min­is­ter of Fi­nance (who) al­ways com­plains.. that the Min­istry of Works utilis­es all the mon­ey in the bud­get and what we set out to do is look at two ar­eas. How these ar­eas could con­tribute to the econ­o­my and when CAF lends us mon­ey, we can utilise it and bring ben­e­fits to the econ­o­my.”

The Min­istry of Works de­signed pro­grams that not on­ly pro­tect the coast­lines but al­so would bring in tourists.

“One of these projects is a sim­ple project on the east coast where we start­ed off with a revet­ment wall. We were able to con­vert that revet­ment wall with just a ten per­cent in­crease in the cost of the bud­get to a board­walk. As we speak that has mor­phed in­to a tourist project be­cause on that coast we have a lot of nat­ur­al re­sources ar­eas that if the in­fra­struc­ture was not there, we would not recognse, you could at­tract tourists in an area like that. So it is more than mere in­fra­struc­ture projects …we could grow the tourism in­dus­try. As we speak, we have 11 such projects around the is­land try­ing to cre­ate a new econ­o­my for the coast­line com­mu­ni­ties. You are ac­tu­al­ly cre­at­ing a new set of busi­ness­peo­ple in those ar­eas.”

They are al­so try­ing to use the ma­rine sec­tor to de­vel­op the econ­o­my.

“A ma­jor nat­ur­al re­source we have is wa­ter. Un­for­tu­nate­ly, in T&T, we nev­er max­imised and took full ad­van­tage of our lo­ca­tion and the fact that we are per­fect­ly placed away from the hur­ri­cane belt. We had a lot of peo­ple com­ing in and pack­ing the drill­ships out in the ocean and we were not col­lect­ing any­thing for that. What we de­cid­ed to do as a Gov­ern­ment is to re-arrange the en­tire mar­itime sec­tor. We have now de­vel­oped a whole in­dus­try out there. It is or­gan­ised and en­sur­ing that the en­vi­ron­ment is pro­tect­ed. We have col­lect­ed a sig­nif­i­cant amount of rev­enue in this area.”

They will soon turn the sod for the con­struc­tion of a new fish­ing port in Moru­ga.

“We will cre­ate an at­mos­phere where the busi­ness will flour­ish. When tourists come in­to the is­land, they can go in­to these re­mote ar­eas and ex­pe­ri­ence a dif­fer­ent cul­ture. We are try­ing to tie de­vel­op­ment with tourism. Ga­le­o­ta Port is go­ing in­to Phase Two. That means that the en­tire east­ern seaboard will be de­vel­oped us­ing ma­rine re­sources. We al­so have an­oth­er ma­jor part in To­co which will en­hance 50 per cent of the land­mass in this coun­try. If we put in a pas­sen­ger ter­mi­nal there, we will cut the time be­tween T&T, by about 30 per cent. Yet, there are so many peo­ple, no em­ploy­ment and yet beau­ti­ful tourist fa­cil­i­ties.”

Toco port makes no sense as it is not a natural harbour while Galeota and the Gulf of Paria need investment to serve the burgeoning industry in Guyana. Population control is the only antidote to homelessness and unemployment.

TO­BA­GO

Chief sec­re­tary, To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA) said To­ba­go has struc­tur­al prob­lems as six out of ten em­ploy­ees work for the THA and two out of the oth­er four per­sons are em­ployed in­di­rect­ly by en­ti­ties that are or­gan­ised to pro­vide ser­vices to the THA. To change this, the THA need­ed to re­vi­talise the tourism sec­tor. THA is hav­ing ex­plorato­ry talks with po­ten­tial in­vestors with re­spect to a ded­i­cat­ed cruise ship port in To­ba­go as part of an at­tempt to de­vel­op the blue econ­o­my.

“We are hear­ing about the blue econ­o­my but we have al­ways en­gaged in ac­tiv­i­ties crit­i­cal to the blue econ­o­my. .. how we ex­ploit the re­sources of the ocean. “We can speak about the reefs that we have.. Buc­coo Reef and Ny­lon Pool and we have al­ways used those as sell­ing points. Now we are go­ing fur­ther and we have oth­er reefs in Spey­side and Char­lot­teville. We are em­pha­sis­ing our dive in­dus­try as part of util­is­ing all our as­sets to fa­cil­i­tate an in­crease in our tourism ar­rivals. The Min­istry of Fi­nance is cur­rent­ly work­ing on pro­pos­als for the con­struc­tion of a mariner in south­west­ern To­ba­go to im­prove that av­enue of our de­vel­op­ment.”

A Caribbean com­pa­ny will as­sess­ the fish­ing in­dus­try. Be­ing sus­tain­able is an im­por­tant as­pect of the blue econ­o­my.

“We have es­tab­lished a coastal zone man­age­ment unit de­signed to treat with pol­i­cy is­sues to man­age To­ba­go’s ero­sion sit­u­a­tion. To­ba­go is vul­ner­a­ble to cli­mate change and ris­ing sea lev­els. We have been im­pact­ed sig­nif­i­cant­ly. Pi­geon Point has been se­vere­ly im­pact­ed.”

THA expects CAF funds through the Min­istry for the coastal de­vel­op­ment strat­e­gy with re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion of Pi­geon Point estimated at $50 mil­lion. “Fi­nanc­ing is a chal­lenge and we would be ap­pre­cia­tive of ad­di­tion­al fund­ing in­clud­ing from the pri­vate sec­tor,” he said.

Recovery In The Oil Corridor from Colombia to Suriname

It is reasonable for oil companies to value contacts with experienced personnel. To paraphrase a proverb, ” There is gold and a multitude of diamonds but the lips of knowledge are a precious jewel.“

Jobs at Exxonmobil are available to Guyanese companies registered with its Centre for Local Business Development.

www.clbdportal.com

At GIPEX 2019, SBM OFFSHORE displayed a variety of jobs at its stand.
On 19 July 2019. Guyana Prime Minister M. Nagamootoo, Ministers A. Ally, R. Trotman , D. Patterson and J. Harmon and Georgetown Mayor Ubrajarine engaged with over 200 business leaders and investors in Trinidad. The Guyanese team detailed investment opportunities and welcomed regional investors to Guyana.

Plans for high level visits to Guyana were discussed. Investors expressed confidence in the Guyanese economy and prospects for exponential growth and development . Trinidad and Tobago Minister of Energy praised the Guyana Government for emphasis on human development, particularly investment in educating young people.

On 19 September 2018 Guyana and Trinidad signed a Memorandum of Understanding on Energy Cooperation in the development of the energy and energy related sectors by developing and promoting joint projects  throughout the hydrocarbon value chain in accordance with the provisions  and without prejudice to their respective national legal systems.

As Trinidad & Tobago companies access oil & gas  jobs that locals are capable of doing, yet another company says it will be providing services in Guyana.   The Couva, Trinidad & Tobago-based Triple D’s Inc. teamed up with TOTALTEC Oilfield Services Guyana Inc to provide transportation to the oil & gas sector.

The company, with a booth at GIPEX, lists its office at lot 447 Plantation, Providence, Guyana. A spokesperson said that the company was in partnership with TOTALTEC. She would speak further when manager of TOTALTEC, Lars Mangal was present. Mangal said that Triple D’s was not a part of TOTALTEC.

Locals need not lament opportunities offered to T&T companies in areas that Guyanese could work in the local Oil and Gas environment. Guyanese find opportunities in security, local transportation and catering which are given to Trinidad companies in full view of authorities and the private sector.

The oil companies promote and endorse these companies. A Trinidad trucking company entered the market to work for one of the biggest oil-field services companies in the world. Local trucking companies can perform these jobs. Yet this company was favoured and has gone after a local company performing taxi services for Exxon and others since 2012.

A Trinidad company secured logistics work for oil companies and local staff run its Guyana operations. Guyanese logistics companies can perform these tasks and ensure that 100% of the profits are retained in country to invest or spend in the local economy.

Another Trinidad company won the waste management tender for Exxon and beat local companies on several bid processes. In no instance did the foreign companies team up with local entities to enhance their local content ratio. Trinidadians in some oil companies direct recruitment of Trinidadian companies.

ICON initiates LNG deliveries into Guyana

Trinidad based ICON LNG, commenced deliveries of liquefied natural gas (LNG) into Guyana using intermodal ISO containers, marking the first LNG imports into the country.

4 ICON LNG Intermodal ISO containers at Demerara Distillers Limited, Diamond

Working with leading Guyana company, Demerara Distillers Limited (DDL), ICON delivers LNG under a multi-year contract as a fuel source for power generation and process heating at DDL’s industrial compound in Plantation Diamond, East Bank Demerara.

DDL also contracted with ICON to convert two Cummins diesel generators to dual fuel, running on a blend of diesel and natural gas, and to design and install Guyana’s first LNG regasification terminal specifically for LNG ISO containers.

“We are extremely pleased with the start-up of dual fuel operations and LNG deliveries to DDL’s manufacturing facility in Guyana”, remarked Stephen Scoon, Chairman of ICON LNG.  “Our ability to provide customers a complete LNG equipment and supply solution sets us apart in the market and allows smaller customers access to LNG, an environmentally friendly and affordable fuel, without having to make significant investments in new power generation equipment.”

Frozen natural gas, LNG is the world’s fastest growing fuel with levels of greenhouse gas emissions lower than fuels such as diesel and heavy fuel oil (HFO).In power generation, heating or for transportation, natural gas emits significantly less carbon dioxide (CO2), less sulphur and nitrogen oxides, and almost zero particulate matter, making it the cleanest available fossil fuel.

Freezing natural gas into LNG allows it to be shipped to anywhere using existing methods at competitive prices.  Under the fuel supply contract with DDL, ICON will deliver approximately 80 LNG tanks per year and grow to over 100 LNG tanks per year by the second half of 2020 with the addition of a gas fired boiler to DDL’s production lines. By substituting diesel with natural gas, DDL will achieve its goal of reducing greenhouse gas emission from its power generation and industrial production operations.

“We are very excited to be the first Guyanese company to use LNG for our energy needs,” said Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Vasudeo Singh. “As part of our efforts to diversify our fuel supply to cleaner alternatives we studied the options and concluded that LNG is a safe and proven fuel globally as well as here in the Caribbean region where it is already being used in operations similar to ours. We are pleased to partner with ICON LNG who provided us turnkey equipment and a supply solution for regular LNG deliveries that will reduce both our annual fuel expenditures as well as our emissions output.”

ICON is the exclusive distributor throughout the Southern Caribbean region of dual fuel systems manufactured by Heinzmann GmbH & Co. based in Schönau, Germany. With over 100 years of history designing and manufacturing engine and turbine management systems, Heinzmann’s dual fuel equipment is a cost effective solution for customers to maintain their existing diesel generators while accessing the benefits of natural gas, such as cost savings, emissions reductions and multi-fuel security. Low and high speed reciprocating engines from 1MW to 10MW can benefit from Heinzmann’s dual fuel technology.

A GLOBAL MULTIDISCIPLINARY INDUSTRY

The multinational petroleum industry operates across boundaries, employing global talent but the Guyana private sector believes that more must be done in the area of local content while Trinidadian companies established a business footing. Guyanese have been employed in the energy and other sectors in Trinidad.

Trinidad and Tobago continued its generous supply of petroleum products to Caricom during high oil prices and continued to supply petroleum products on credit to heavily indebted Guyana in 1970s to 1980s when a brain drain escalated as migrants fled oppression.

One of Guyana’s largest creditors since 1988, Trinidad and Tobago forgave Guyana the single largest amount of debt of hundreds of millions of US dollars at the conclusion of the debt forgiveness process under the Paris Club arrangements for Guyana in 1996. Guyana’s outstanding debt liabilities to Trinidad and Tobago amounted to US$536.2 million. Trinidad and Tobago provided additional debt forgiveness of US$359.2 million.

The President of the Energy Chamber of Trinidad and Tobago downplayed fears of locals. His chamber has seen interests from larger companies that sell to major operators and other Trinidadian companies and they are looking to partner or act as intermediaries for Guyanese service companies. Guyana is learning from a CARICOM co-founder with over a century of experience in the petroleum sector, transferring skills and sharing experience.

“We are a real mix of Trinidadian companies. There is the freedom of capital to move around the Caribbean so companies are going to be here and investing. Some things that used to be invested directly from Trinidad to Guyana’s offshore industry, and that has been going on for a while …over time you will see that shifting and coming directly from here.”

Multinational companies, UN international aid from tax and other altruistic donors fund grants and scholarships, enriching Guyana with over USD 7 million for education and community projects. As a STEM patron and mentor, ECO donates valuable books, journals, maps, charts and other publications, rock and fossil collections and equipment to UWI, UTT, NESC, NIHERST and UG to build regional professional capacity in petroleum technology