The extent of the development projects offshore Guyana within such a short space of time since the first oil discovery in 2015 is being viewed as ‘unbelievable’ by Norway-based energy research and business intelligence company, Rystad Energy. Now, the South American country, unknown on the oil map just seven years ago, is on track to overtake the U.S. Gulf of Mexico in an unprecendented production ramp up into the early 2030s.
U.S. oil major ExxonMobil hit pay at Liza-1 back in 2015, delivering the first ever oil discovery for Guyana after multiple companies drilled over 40 wells in previous years offshore the country with no success. Less than five years later, oil production began at Liza Phase 1 and just this month, Phase 2 of the Liza development started up. This will push Guyana’s total output by the end of the year to around 340,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd).
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“Well, it’s unbelievable in terms of the timing. You’ve almost never seen from discovery to first oil to production ramp up occur at this pace in any other offshore province, maybe except Brazil which deals more with the nature of the wells and the presalt than it does with the development plans that Exxon has put together,” Schreiner Parker, Rystad Energy’s Vice President for Latin America and the Caribbean, told OilNOW.
And this is just the beginning. Exxon is set to bring a new development online almost every year this decade. A third project at Payara has already been sanctioned and a fourth at Yellowtail is pending government approval. By 2025/26, these projects will push Guyana’s total production to well over 800,000 bpd.
‘Highly prolific quality reservoir’ targeted for Exxon’s 5th development in Guyana
Additionally, Exxon has already signaled its 5th development will be at Uaru and has said it anticipates operating around 10 FPSOs to develop the resources found so far at Stabroek Block. The company has found over 10 billion barrels of oil equivalent since 2015.
A senior government official told lawmakers in Guyana in December that the country is preparing for a massive uptick in demand for a range of goods and services driven by what can become a 12-FPSO, 1.5 million barrels of oil per day industry in the early 2030s.
“So, by 2025, Guyana becomes the sixth largest deep water crude producer in the world. By 2028, it becomes the fourth largest producer and by 2033, it’s the second largest, overcoming the US Gulf of Mexico’s output,” Parker said. “So, absolutely significant and game changing when it comes to changing the world oil map.”
