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Oil Company holding Berbice Block had no employees in 2019 – EITI Report
Map showing the location of the Berbice Block along with two others (Demerara and Corentyne which are also held by CGX)
Kaieteur News – In Guyana’s third report to the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), an international watchdog that allows citizens to track revenues remitted to the State from the oil and mining sectors, the spotlight was placed on the employment records of onshore and offshore petroleum explorers.
Of all the companies listed, however, only one entity reported no employees for the 2019 reporting period. That company is ON Energy Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Canadian firm, CGX Resources Inc. On Energy holds the Berbice Block for which it signed an agreement with the State on February 15, 2013.
The report notes that CGX has 30 male and eight female Guyanese employees. No expatriates were on its payroll for 2019.
For ExxonMobil subsidiary, Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited (EEPGL), the Stabroek Block operator reported 52 males and 29 females, all from Guyana being part of their permanent staff along with 109 male foreigners and 15 female expats. Total workforce at the time of the 2019 reporting period was therefore 205. (The chart attached to this article shows a breakdown of other oil companies’ employment of locals and foreigners by gender).
According to CGX’s website, the company has a 62 percent stake in ON Energy Inc. which received the Berbice Block which spanned at the time, 1,566.2 km2.
Back then, the Berbice Block was also adjacent to a portion of the Corentyne that stretched from offshore to onshore. On the two onshore concessions, ON Energy completed a geochemical sampling programme and a 2D seismic programme, to fulfill the minimum work obligations, plus drilled three exploration wells which were assessed to be dry-holes.
On February 12, 2013, the Government of Guyana issued a new Berbice Petroleum Agreement to ON Energy, comprising both Berbice and the onshore portion of the Corentyne Block, thus increasing the size of the acerage to 3,295 km2 . Under the terms of the new Berbice deal, during the initial period of four years, ON Energy had an obligation to conduct an airborne survey comprising a minimum of 1,000 km2 and either conduct a 2D seismic survey comprising a minimum of 100 km2 or drill one exploration well. Four years later, the company contracted Exploration Technologies Inc., a Houston, Texas based geochemical survey company, to conduct a geochemical survey. The field survey started on October 27, 2018 and was completed on November 4, 2018. A total of 317 sample points and 49 blanks were taken. The survey covered a total area of approximately 391 km2.
In 2020, ON Energy submitted its proposed 25 percent acreage relinquishment which is required by the Berbice Petroleum Agreement and is awaiting the government’s agreement and final instruments to formally move into the second renewal period of the agreement which will last three years.
On February 4, 2022, the company, through ON Energy Inc. notified the government that, given the focus on the Corentyne Block (which delivered an oil discovery at the Kawa-1 well) along with operational considerations and investment priorities, ON Energy Inc. is unable to drill an exploration well on the Berbice Block in 2022.
It proposed that seismic acquisition on the block be shifted to commence in January 2023.
On February 21, 2022, the Ministry of Natural Resources informed ON Energy that it must drill one commitment exploration well and acquire seismic on the Berbice Block prior to the expiry of the Berbice petroleum prospecting licence and associated petroleum agreement in February 2023.
The company said it will seek further dialogue with the ministry regarding this guidance.
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