— says Prashad, calls on Gov’t to expedite requests for land, concessions

GUYANA needs to position itself to gain a significant portion of the spill-off commercial opportunities from ExxonMobil’s US$9 billion Payara Development Project.
The US$9 billion project has been described as the single largest investment in Guyana and is twice the size of the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), which is close to US$4 billion.
President of the Guyana Oil and Gas Energy Chamber (GOGEC), Manniram Prashad, while congratulating the government and ExxonMobil for reaching an agreement, believes that the spill-off opportunities from this project will be immense, and Guyanese must be ready to capitalise.

ExxonMobil, following a recent agreement with the Government of Guyana, has decided to proceed with the Payara field development offshore Guyana.
Payara is the company’s third project in the Stabroek Block and is expected to produce up to 220,000 barrels of oil per day after start-up in 2024, using the Prosperity floating production, storage and offloading (FPSO) vessel.
The $9billion development will target an estimated resource base of about 600 million oil-equivalent barrels. Ten drill centres are planned, along with up to 41 wells, including 20 production and 21 injection wells.

“During this period, and up to 2024, there will be significant increase in the demand for goods and services to sustain this level of operation which will have at least 10 drill centres,” said Prashad.
He believes that Guyanese will be better able to capitalise on these opportunities once there is a ‘solid’ Local Content Policy.
“GOGEC is now urging the Local Content Policy Committee to step up the pace so as to bring a favorable Local Content Policy, so Guyanese businesses can benefit from this massive investment,” said Prashad.

He also called on government to expedite all pending requests and applications for land and concessions from ‘established’ and ‘legitimate’ local businesses, which want to expand and establish new facilities to service the new oil and gas sector.
Although local content is important, Prashad also commended government for revising the Payara licence and including measures which include the prohibition of routine gas flaring.
ExxonMobil’s first offshore Guyana project, Liza Phase 1, began producing in late 2019 well ahead of the industry average for development time. Liza Phase 2 remains on track to begin producing oil by early 2022.

Liza Phase 2 will produce up to 220,000 barrels of oil per day at peak rates, using the Liza Unity FPSO, which is under construction in Singapore.
ExxonMobil and its prime contractors have spent over $300 million with more than 700 local companies since 2015. More than 2,500 Guyanese companies are registered with the Centre for Local Business Development, which was founded by ExxonMobil and its co-venturers in 2017, to build local business capacity to support global competitiveness.

The Stabroek Block is 6.6 million acres (26,800 square kilometres) with current discovered recoverable resources estimated at more than eight billion oil-equivalent barrels. The 18 discoveries on the block to date have established the potential for at least five FPSO vessels producing more than 750,000 barrels of oil per day by 2026.