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Jagdeo to monitor oil sector after completing new PSA, Petroleum Act
Kaieteur News – Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo on Thursday said government will shift its focus on monitoring the oil and gas operations once it completes the new Production Sharing Agreement (PSA) to govern future oil blocks, and update the 1986 Petroleum Act.
He was at the time responding to a question from this newspaper during his press conference on Thursday, regarding monitoring of the ongoing production activities from an environmental perspective, as more projects continue to be approved.
Vice President, Bharrat Jagdeo
The VP explained, “I said we are trying to deal with the framework first and that is why you have seen us focus on a lot of things we criticized when we were in Opposition- the PSA, the Petroleum Act not being sufficient… we’re fixing those two. We criticized the Natural Resources Fund Act, we fixed that. We passed the new Local Content Law, so these are things that we said we need to fix and auction and all of those.”
Jagdeo added, “I admitted that last time that because our focus has been on the framework, the next wave of the attention of the ministry and the government will be on building greater monitoring capability.”
The VP said that after strengthening those provisions, the government will ensure for example that the data ExxonMobil supplies the nation with is accurate.
“So they will have a fiber that they are building that will have an operating centre that is remote in the Headquarter, that is why when we spoke about the headquarter, it’s not just a headquarter, it would have an operating center there where they can remotely address any issue on the rigs, like shut off and things like that,” he noted.
Jagdeo said government will be pursuing one of two options to conduct monitoring of Exxon’s operations; these include utilizing an independent remote technology or accessing the feed from Exxon’s headquarter that is currently being constructed at Ogle, East Coast Demerara (ECD).
This system he explained will verify the amount of oil flowing through the pipelines and other real-time data on the company’s activities.
He noted that during a visit to Ghana, he met with a group that is monitoring gas fields. According to him, it was a Canadian company, owned by Guyanese. Subsequently, the firm submitted a proposal to the Guyana government, pressing the administration to move on the issue.
The VP indicated that even though proposals have been made by the company, government’s intent is to go out to tender. Be that as it may, he said, “We will go out to tender but of course there will be preferences if there is a Guyanese-owned company that can do this and they have great international capability…looking at offshore monitoring etc.”
As such, he conceded, “Clearly that is a bit deficient at this point, but this is the next wave of what we have to do. It’s the progression.”
- ENVIRONMENT, focus, Monitor, oil, shift
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