Contract awarded in oil and gas sector without open tender

May 01, 2017 Letters

Dear Editor,
According to an April 28, 2017 report (at http://oilnow.gy/production/ worley-parsons-review- exxonmobils-development-plan/) in the “OilNow”, “The Government of Guyana has contracted Australian resources and energy consultants Worley Parsons to review ExxonMobil’s initial development plan in preparation for petroleum production from its Stabroek Block come 2020.”
Worley Parsons has been a contractor for ExxonMobil, it was once sued by ExxonMobil for “errors” in the building of one of the world’s largest offshore platforms, and it ended up making a US$55M settlement payment to ExxonMobil for those “errors.”
This report comes on the heels of a report in the media, namely that the Government of Guyana has awarded a US$70,000 contract to “Energy Narrative” to do a “desktop study” of the “options, costs, economic impact and key considerations of transporting and utilising natural gas from offshore Guyana for electricity generation; and a verification of natural gas projections, a verification of natural gas demand projections, as well as to analyse the technical feasibility of a proposed natural gas pipeline.”
These issues are all important, so varied and of so many dimensions, that it surprises me that a contract has already been awarded to a single company without there being any attempt at an open tender, in order to get the benefit of several companies bidding.
What is even more interesting is that a ‘desktop study” to verify natural gas (production) projections must use data, and in all likelihood those data will be supplied by ExxonMobil. If these reports are correct, then Guyana’s interests and those of developer must be nicely aligned. At least the Government of Guyana must have this view.
Thomas B. Singh (PhD)
Senior Lecturer
Dept. of Economics
University of Guyana

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