Guyana’s gas resources can create more jobs, wealth through new export products – NYU’s Director of Energy

Feb 19, 2025 News

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By Allyiah Allicock

Kaieteur News- Director of Energy, Climate Justice, and Sustainability Lab Research Professor at New York University’s School of Professional Studies, Amy Meyers Jaffe, on Tuesday said that Guyana’s natural gas is a great resource and can be used to create employment opportunities for citizens while at the same time add more wealth to the country.

The Director made these remarks on the first day of the 2025 Guyana Energy Conference which is being held at the Guyana Marriott Hotel at Kingston.

Jaffe in her brief presentation elaborated on the possibilities that exist to use Guyana’s natural gas resource.

In explaining these options in the form of case studies, the Director said, “Try to think about how to develop internal industries that might be reflective of growth that is going to come in the market.”

On this point she shared that in the case of Trinidad and Tobago, for years they had tremendous success with their ammonia export plant.

“People believe that the global trade in ammonia is going to grow by 10 times by 2050. We are expected to see a 30% growth in capacity by 2029, and again Guyana is really well placed because not only do you have natural gas but you also have these plans to go to hydro and other renewable resources and so you could participate both in traditional natural gas based, ammonia possibly eventually putting in CCS (Carbon capture and storage) as it is happening in Louisiana (USA),” she briefed.

Jaffe said that in blending in renewable resources to bring export capacity in ammonia,  is a very important market for fertilizers.

“So again, big potential there to think about how that might be beneficial to Guyana’s long-term economy and maybe in a joint venture with Trinidad and Tobago, given the fact that they are starting to shutter their plans for lack of natural gas supply. Kind of an interesting time to think about the ammonia market,” she pointed out.

Another option, the Energy expert stated, was the potential for the country to build its own terminal natural gas plant and be an export to other Caribbean nations.

“In matters to look at the experience of North Africa and Europe where we are seeing increased interest in trading electricity. Now your neighbours in CARICOM have high dependency on oil for burning of electricity and that has turned out to be quite an economic burden. One of the things that is interesting is because they have so much small economies and the kind of projects it would take to build new electricity is expensive,” she informed.

She continued, “You could look at the case study of North Africa’s relationship with Southern Europe and think about whether or not Guyana can be an exporter of electricity by building a long-distance wire from Guyana to the Caribbean and provide your neighbours with electricity by wire instead of trying to figure out a way to bring the natural gas itself. You would convert the natural gas to electricity in Guyana and then export the electricity to CARICOM and other neighbouring countries.”

Stating another option the country can look at, Jaffe said there is a case of compressing the natural gas (CNG) to fuel vehicles.

Providing how this works, she elaborated, “One of the interesting things that happened in Oklahoma (USA) was that they came up with their first energy plan of 2011. Where the entire government switched its state to compress its natural gas, you know you can do that after markets so it does not require you to buy new vehicles.  Then they provided a set of tax breaks to businesses also to convert their vehicles to CNG and to individuals and citizens to convert to CNG and then they offer generous tax credits to some of the natural gas companies in Oklahoma to develop the construction of CNG fueling stations.”

According to the Director, this plan has been a successful one, which saw the state making CNG available at every 100 miles in the state.

While these options can be beneficial to the country, the NYU Energy Director said that Guyana’s natural gas is a great resource to really think through, since it can build jobs and add more energy security and more resources as the country moves in other industries.

“For example, as Guyana enhances its tourism industry, you know having CNG vehicles or electric vehicles that are fueled with your natural gas  is yet another way, because as more tourists come the demand for transportation and for electricity for hotels is going to go up,” she noted.

She added too that it is all very complementary to think about how to integrate the natural gas resources the country has into the growing economy that is getting a boost from its oil revenue.

(Guyana’s gas resources can create more jobs, wealth through new export products – NYU’s Director of Energy)

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• Climate Justice, Director of Energy, Guyana’s natural gas, Lab Research Professor

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