Local, Int’l partnership enhances Guyana’s capacity for Oil and Gas sector

Oct 04, 2017 News

The partnership between Ground Structures Engineering Consultants (GSEC), a local geo-technical engineering company and Fugro, an international provider of geo-intelligence, is already bearing fruit.

The Partnership’s new office building in Progress

The Fugro-GSEC alliance has resulted in training in the Fugro Houston soils laboratory for six members of GSEC staff, Basic Offshore Safety Induction and Emergency Training (BOSIET) certification for 10 members of GSEC staff, Panamanian Seaman Book training for six members of GSEC Staff, Protected Species (marine mammals and seabird) certification for two biologists on GSEC Staff provided by ExxonMobil and Remotely Operated Vehicle (ROV) Pilot training in the near future for GSEC personnel at one of Fugro’s ROV centres of excellence.
According to GSEC, its staff is currently conducting geotechnical laboratory tests on soil samples recovered during the Liza 1 geotechnical drilling programme.
GSEC officials stated that the intention is to confirm the competence of the laboratory technicians to replicate the results produced by Fugro and to utilize the laboratory for additional soil tests in the future based on that competence.
The Fugro-GSEC partnership agreement is also expected to build up the local content of Guyana to allow Fugro to train GSEC staff to provide services to the Oil and Gas market as they expand their presence in Guyana.
So far, GSEC has provided six soil technicians and three engineers to work on the marine geotechnical investigation for the Liza Field development, for ExxonMobil. Additionally, the GSEC staff was trained globally, by Fugro, to enhance their expertise and competencies over the period of March to June 2017. This training will continue to progressively extend GSEC capacity to respond to demands for local content providers.
The team is expected to collect, organize and interpret project-critical, geotechnical and environmental data (both onshore and offshore) for companies like ExxonMobil. Their mission is to protect the life-cycle of the project by providing geo-related designs, asset inspections and integrity advice.
GSEC is also constructing a new building to meet the growing needs in Guyana and Fugro will also have a local office in this new location. Fugro’s Country Manager for Guyana and Columbia, Brian Hottman insists that “in order to provide the technical data and information required to design, construct and maintain projects like this, we need to be on site to do it in a safe, reliable and efficient manner.”
It was also noted that the 10,000 sq. feet of new developed office space will have a soils and materials laboratory. All GSEC drilling operations will be operated out of this location. The building will also house an electronic lab and repository for the storage of all geotechnical, geosciences and environmental projects undertaken by GSEC/Fugro.
It was in April 2017, that the partnership between the two companies was solidified.
Hottman had announced the partnership as an, “important step forward for the integrity of developing the oil and gas fields in Guyana.”
Fugro is the world’s leading, independent provider of geo-intelligence and asset integrity solutions for large construction, infrastructure and natural resources based projects. They have been servicing the oil and gas sector in Guyana since 1991 when work was conducted on the Geochemical Survey of the Waini River Area, Pomeroon Block.
Ground Structures Engineer Consultants is an employee-owned company, based in Georgetown. As extraction industry specialists, it has profound experience in diverse projects in geo-technical, coastal engineering, and environmental management.