Pleasing dream, or recurring nightmare

Apr 19, 2026 Editorial, News

(Kaieteur News) – The Wales Gas-to-Energy (GTE) seems to be running out of gas and excuses. The constant is the series of delays, with Guyanese hanging on to every bit of news, in their hope for high electricity bill relief, and a reliable supply of cheap energy. The GTE project was to start firing in 2024, then 2025 came and went, and it was the same old story of Guyanese politicians promising a dream, but delivering the first glimpses of what is shaping up to be a nightmare. No operational Liquid Natural Gas facility and no power generation plant in action, at Wales. Meanwhile, citizens still grapple with a high cost-of-living environment, and steep electricity bills and blackouts that could come in waves.

In the early stages, the GTE champion, Vice President Jagdeo, couldn’t stop talking about electricity bills reduced by 50% and a steady supply of this commodity that means so much and does so much. Where is the vice president and chief oil and gas policymaker now, and what does he have to offer Guyanese waiting and longing for answers about this US$2B GTE project? What many citizens suspect is now many scarce US millions above that US$2B price that is more about guesswork than built on any solid and principled foundation. Where is the vice president these days, and what does he have to say about the gas coming from 130 miles away to fire the turbines and get them going, as in delivering to energy-starved consumers?

We at this paper would love to hear from him about the bottom line with the gas. He himself had said that the gas is free, so the question is whether that is still the case. If it is not, then he and the PPPC Government, from Natural Resources Minister, Vickram Bharrat to President Ali, should face the nation and say why the gas is not free. If it is not free, then there would be the appalling development, the sick spectacle, of Guyana buying its own gas from an entity that is supposed to be a partner, ExxonMobil. There are few issues that would be more unacceptable than Guyana buying its own gas and paying ExxonMobil, through cost recovery from this country’s oil, or some other collection arrangement. This is the problem with a government and leaders too firmly set in the driver’s seat: they believe that they can do anything, pull any trick, and get away with them.

One of the many tricks of the PPPC Government is its addiction to secrecy. Even in the instances when burning, expensive, issues may not be executed under the table, the government still persists with its culture of secrecy. Laying signed agreements and other GTE projects in parliament has made into a treadmill by different government agents and spokespeople. They give their best impression of doing something and going somewhere, when, in fact, nothing is moving, nothing is laid in parliament, and nothing is shared with Guyanese taxpayers, who are funding the Wales US$2B project. At this point, it is reasonable to ask if the Wales GTE is not the newest Bharrat Jagdeo scheme that resembles the costly and ill-fated Skeldon sugar plant. The Skeldon plant was promised to do so much, just like the Wales GTE, only for the former to fizzle and be an elephant that both Jagdeo and the government prefers not to have anything to do with. Are Guyanese staring at the return of a more expensive Skeldon that is lurching from one alarming exposure to another?

It seems almost a foregone conclusion that Guyana will have to pay for the gas to feed the plants at Wales. What did the PPPC Government and ExxonMobil bargain between themselves as the price for the vital gas to be converted at Wales, then delivered as electricity to citizens? What impact will that gas that’s no longer free have on the promised half-priced electricity made by Vice President Jagdeo? With the gas likely at commercial rates, we wait to hear what verbal gymnastics he will concoct as justification for another failed promise? An abundance of gas should be an energy dream, but in usual Jagdeo fashion, nightmares are all he knows to deliver.

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Editorial, Electricity, GTE project, nightmare, Wales Gas-to-Energy

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