WHILE the world struggled to adjust to the new COVID-19 variants of interest and concern in the second month of 2022, and nations pondered the consequences of a gathering political storm of global proportions in Europe, Guyana hosted a three-day international energy conference.

Aimed at looking beyond Guyana, and oil & gas, the February 17-20, 2022 International Energy Conference and Expo hosted at the Georgetown Marriott Hotel under the theme, “Charting a Sustainable Energy Future”, exceeded all expectations, attracting 32 sponsors and 822 participants, 53 exhibitors, and 47 presenters.

Never mind the travel restrictions, the hybrid conference (Online and face-to-face) attracted attention and participation from stakeholders way beyond Guyana’s borders, land and sea, and created vital business linkages between major and minor oil, gas end energy players at the local, regional and international levels.

Hosted by public and private sector sponsors to keep apace with Guyana’s fast-growing oil-and-gas industry, the event focused on broader discussions on contemporary related global factors like climate change and sustainability; diversified economic development; and regional and international energy cooperation.

That the inaugural event was organised and funded entirely privately by the newly-formed International Energy Conference and Expo Inc. — headed by Anthony Whyte, Chairman, and Angenie Abe, Chief Executive Officer, and a supporting team of almost entirely young Guyanese — was the greatest achievement.

Aimed at inviting participation by oil, gas and energy experts, and government and industry officials, and achieving a common goal and win-win situations for all, the conference attracted the personal presence of Ghana’s President Nana Akufo-Addo; Suriname’s President Chandrikapersad Santoki, and Barbados’ Prime Minister Mia Mottley, alongside ExxonMobil’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Darren Woods, and Hess Corporation’s CEO, John Hess.

Well attended by local businesses, as well as regional and international firms, the conference also served as a platform for creating new partnerships among local and foreign companies to form synergies, sharing resources and capabilities, improving competitiveness, and building capacity to meet the growing demand for goods and services in the energy sector.

Among the goals the conference achieved, the reviewers tabulated: Gathering the world’s biggest names in the energy sector; creating an enabling environment for high-level business-to-business engagements; facilitating smaller business-to-business engagements; creating opportunities for business-to-government and government-to-government engagements; and creating partnerships and linkages between Guyanese businesses and international entities.

The Guyana Oil and Gas Energy Chamber (GOGEC) has also given the conference high marks, but says, too, that “the real work has now begun, for more reasons than one”.

Businesses at home and abroad always anxious to benefit from new opportunities, the Georgetown conference also opened up areas of international trade, and investment opportunities for local, regional and foreign investors from across Guyana, the Caribbean and the rest of the world.

GOGEC notes that more partnerships with local companies ultimately mean more business, more job-creation, and greater competition for a newly-skilled labour force; and greater incentives for more Guyanese, first and foremost, to enhance their own competitiveness in the new and ever-expanding job market.

With their nation finally well-positioned to continue moving up the growth ladder, Guyana’s rapid expansion and development presents a plethora of opportunities for all stakeholders, and to ultimately improve the standard of living for all Guyanese.

ExxonMobil, alone, projects that over the next decade, it’ll be pumping oil and gas from six projects by 2027, and another four by the end 2032, increasing daily production to over one million barrels per day.

ExxonMobil’s chairman and CEO Darren Woods’ participation also allowed his hosts to acknowledge the win-win factor behind his company’s role in taking Guyana’s Oil & Gas sector to where it is today, on its current economic transformation and development trajectory.

The conference also drew to the urgent attention of Guyanese businesses the need to move, fast, to quickly prepare for the new opportunities, and challenges, that will follow.

Oil and gas being only as one joint component of the broader energy conversation, broadening the energy conversations beyond just oil & gas and Guyana was another major goal achieved, as the conference brought policymakers and industry practitioners, professionals and professors together in a single discussion with a common denominator: What the energy future will look like for Guyana and the world, in the current national, regional and global context.

Looking ahead, organisers say the 2022 conference surely laid a foundation for the next related gathering of minds — already slated for February 14 -17, 2023 – planning for it to be bigger and better with the inclusion of more industries and conversations on how to adapt to and adopt sustainable measures.

The global effects of escalating developments in Europe laid bare the interconnectedness between all points in the energy industry — from natural gas to nuclear power — and examined ways of connecting those relationships today, tomorrow and the future, for the benefit of governments, people and stakeholders everywhere.

The ease and speed with which developments in one part of the world can affect nations and people in other corners of the globe was again laid bare against the backdrop of oil prices floating and hovering above the US$100 million mark that can spell boon and boom for some, and doom and gloom for others.

The choices of energy alternatives from fossil to nuclear fuels also pose different challenges for different countries and energy industry players, from the cost and speed of transitioning to new sources, to the unpredictability of environmental and climate change, to the planned and unplanned effects of global politics and economics on the speed and reliability of advance planning.

Ensuring a clear understanding that energy goes beyond Oil & Gas was an important objective, and, with that achieved, the conference organisers must be both applauded and encouraged to ensure that next year’s will build on the progress achieved in 2022, and prepare Guyana’s energy industry for several other giant leaps forward in 2024 and beyond.

As always, all will depend on all what happens along the road to the next conference — how COVID and Supply Chain problems work out, how the international energy market adjusts to developments in Europe after the first conference ended and a host of other unpredictable factors.

But one thing is predictable, if only from related past and present experiences: The Guyana Government will remain on a path that allows it to continue to improve the lives and livelihoods of all Guyanese, while adjusting to new realities, overcoming new challenges, and welcoming new opportunities to genuinely ensure the nation’s energy needs are addressed with sustainability and the future both in mind.