Maximum fiscal discipline and transparency will be required to ensure Guyana’s vast oil and gas resources are managed judiciously, the country’s Vice President, Dr. Bharrat Jagdeo has said. Authorities in the South American country are firm in their plan to develop the multi-billion-barrel hydrocarbon resources discovered over 100 miles offshore while ensuring that Guyana remains committed to its low carbon development objectives.
Dr. Jagdeo told attendees at a session sponsored by the Baker Institute Center for Energy Studies in Houston last week that the oil and gas resources must help Guyana keep its non-oil economy diversified and should be used to accelerate the supply of affordable energy to the population of just over 750,000.
“It will be used to ensure that we create enough opportunities in other sectors of the economy such as agriculture, ICT, tourism, etcetera., that can continue to generate wealth, for the future and for people,” he said, pointing out that this is the first transition. “Secondly, the resources now can help us to accelerate our supply of energy to the people. The cost of electricity is 30 cents per kilowatt-hour. One of the highest in the region and we need to get that down to half.”
The government is pursuing a US$900 million gas-to-energy project with is expected to play a major transformational role in the country’s development. This is part of a broad energy mix being developed to advance the Guyanese economy and elevate the standard of living.
“So, our energy transition now is going to be a mixture of gas, hydro and solar and maybe some wind power too,” Dr. Jagdeo said.
This would replace all the Bunker C and diesel that Guyana is currently using to generate power thereby increasing the country’s install capacity fourfold while doing so at around the same current level of emissions.
“We are carefully looking [at] these things now. Clearly the oil and gas industry will bring increased emissions, but the regulatory agencies and these companies will have to look at cutting edge technology that are less polluting,” the Vice President said. “We have had that discussion with them already and I know there is a serious effort to address this now globally.”
