Govt. advisor puts oil reserve at 15B barrels

May 02, 2024 ExxonMobil, News, Oil & Gas

Chairman of Wales Development Authority, Asgar Ally

– but VP Jagdeo and Exxon’s Routledge say no significant increase

Kaieteur News – Chairman of Wales Development Authority, Asgar Ally has said that some 15 billion barrels of oil have already been discovered to date in the Stabroek Block. This is despite Vice President (VP) Bharrat Jagdeo and ExxonMobil Guyana Limited (EMGL) Country Manager, Alistair Routledge maintaining that the country’s resources have not significantly moved since the last update in 2022 when it was at 11 billion barrels.

Ally, a former Finance Minister and former Deputy Governor of the Bank of Jamaica, represented Guyana at the Jamaica Stock Exchange Conference held back in January. During an interview at the conference he made the disclosure of an additional 4 billion barrels of oil being discovered. “As of this point in time we don’t know the full extent of the oil deposits but it’s huge and I could explain what that means. It’s about I would say they have identified at least 15 billion barrels of oil in the (Stabroek) Block. So at this point in time, I would say Exxon has identified about 25 to 35% of that,” Ally who is an economist stated.

Although eight new discoveries were made since Guyana’s last resource update in April 2022, with one of those estimated to hold some 746 million barrels of oil, Exxon and Guyana’s Vice President have stated that the country’s estimated 11 billion barrels of recoverable resources remain with no significant improvement.

However, Ally is contending that over 4 billion barrels more have been discovered. Added to this, he explained, “If you have the time, I can explain to you what has happened. You see at one stage, Africa and Latin America were joined together. So West Africa is closer to the South American coast, of which Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname, a part of and there is under that coast a basin of oil, huge basin of oil.” “Every day we are finding new oil discoveries… Nobody knows the full extent (but) everyday they are finding more,” he added.

On Tuesday, Routledge during Exxon’s press conference made a distinction between oil reserves and resources. He explained, “When we have a better ability to understand that through looking at concepts, the number of wells and testing of the reservoirs then we are able to move to greater certainty and the greater certainty we have is when we sanction a new project as we did with Whiptail. That is when we start to call them reserves. We are now at the point where we can consider that these are going to be developed and produced so its reserves not resource.”

To this end, Routledge said that the six sanctioned projects in the Stabroek Block are estimated to hold some 4.8 billion barrels of oil reserves. Describing the process to determine oil reserves as an “ongoing complex exercise,” the Country Manager pointed out that the company has been providing quarterly updates to the government on the estimated recoverable resources. “We provide quarterly updates to the government, that number hasn’t moved hugely in the recent months but it is something that we continue to look at and we update the government,” Routledge said.

He was then asked for an update on how the country’s resources have grown since the 11 billion barrels estimate in 2022. In response to the question, Routledge said, “I think I’ve answered that, it’s the same as what Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo has said, the 11 billion hasn’t significantly changed, we continue to update the government.”

Asgar Ally, barrels, Chairman of Wales Development Authority, ExxonMobil Guyana Limited (EMGL), Jamaica

Latest News