Against the backdrop of a decline in proven natural gas reserves in North America, Guyana’s President, Dr. Mohamed Irfaan Ali is advocating for Trinidad and Tobago’s gas reserves to be part of the solution. The Head of State made these remarks when he delivered a statement at the Second Plenary Session of the IX Summit of the Americas on Friday. This international meet is being hosted in Los Angeles, California.
“In 2020,” President Ali said, “data shows that in North America, 35% of the nation’s energy originates from petroleum, 10% from coal and 34% from natural gas.”
He said proven reserves of crude oil decreased by nine billion barrels in 2020, a decline of 19% and proven reserves of natural gas decreased by 22 trillion cubic feet, a decline of 4%.
“Whilst we confront this decline, therein lies opportunity. Trinidad and Tobago has an opportunity of proven reserves of natural gas of 10 trillion cubic feet and an estimated potential of 23 trillion cubic feet. They must be part of the equation in finding a solution to this problem,” the Guyanese leader said.
According to the Prime Minister of Trinidad and Tobago, Dr. Keith Rowley, the latest gas reserve audit for the country established that at year-end 2020, technically recoverable resources amounted to 23.2 trillion cubic feet (tcf) and prospective resources at 55.2 tcf.
Given these audit results, the Prime Minister said efforts are underway to lead an aggressive series of bid rounds to expeditiously unlock and monetise these resources since other territories are already moving in this direction before year-end.
During his country’s recently concluded Energy Conference, PM Rowley had said, “We have embarked on a series of bids rounds which commenced with the deepwater bid-round in December of last year.”
The closing ceremony for this bid round was held on June 2, 2022, which saw deepwater acreage comprising 17 blocks receiving a poor response. Four bids were received by a consortium of BP and BG/Shell. The CARICOM leader said another eight licensing rounds that are open, are expected to close by the end of 2022.
