Page 6 - NorthAmOil Week 48 2022

NorthAmOil COMMENTARY NorthAmOil

US grants Chevron partial waiver

from sanctions on Venezuela

The US Department of the Treasury has authorised Chevron to resume oil production

at existing joint venture projects

US-VENEZUELA NEARLY four years have passed since Nicolas restart oil production in Venezuela.
Maduro won another term as the president of The US Treasury Department unveiled the
WHAT: Venezuela. He secured that term in an election new policy in a statement on November 26,
OFAC has issued GL 41, that was marked by widespread allegations of saying in a statement that the Office of Foreign
which grants Chevron fraud, and the US government, then headed Asset Control (OFAC) had issued a document
permission to restart oil by President Donald Trump, responded by known as Venezuela General License (GL) 41
production in Venezuela. declaring opposition leader Juan Guaido to be to Chevron. Under this document, it said, the
Venezuela’s rightful leader and then imposing US major may resume activities and operations
WHY: sanctions on the country’s petroleum industry. in Venezuela – but only those related to its exist-
The deal was struck The sanctions regime then outlasted Trump ing joint ventures with PdVSA, not to any new
after the Maduro and remained in place after Joe Biden assumed projects.
administration and the the US presidency in early 2021. Even though The statement stressed that GL 41 had been
Venezuelan opposition the new administration did not have the same issued in response to the Maduro regime’s
returned to Mexico City degree of hostility to Maduro, who favours the agreement to resume discussions with Vene-
for talks on elections. Bolivarian socialist precepts espoused by his zuela’s main opposition body on a new election
predecessor Hugo Chavez, it did not rush to lift deal. “On November 26, the Unitary Platform
WHAT NEXT: the restrictions on investment and trading in and the Maduro regime announced the resump-
Chevron is showing more Venezuelan oil, gas and fuels. tion of talks in Mexico City; a humanitarian
caution, as officials However, the Biden team does appear to have agreement focused on education, health, food
in Caracas seeking to seen the Russian invasion of Ukraine as a rea- security, flood response and electricity pro-
eliminate conditions. son to reconsider policy toward Caracas. Some grammes that will benefit the Venezuelan peo-
officials in Washington suggested earlier this ple; and agreement on the continuation of talks
year that PdVSA, Venezuela’s national oil com- focused on the 2024 elections,” it said. It also
pany (NOC), be given permission to ramp up emphasised that official US policy was to make
oil production and exports in order to compen- sanctions relief conditional on progress toward
sate for the removal or redirection of Russian a deal on elections between the government and
crude supplies from their traditional markets, the opposition. The Biden team
for example. Others took the more concrete step
of authorising Eni (Italy) to resume shipments First take in Caracas does appear to
of Venezuelan crude oil to Europe without any The Treasury Department’s announcement met have seen the
risk of sanctions penalties. with an enthusiastic reception in Caracas.
According to previous reports, Eni began tak- On November 29, Venezuela’s Petroleum Russian invasion
ing advantage of that green light in the second Minister Tareck El Aissami wrote in a Twitter
quarter of the year. In the first round of deliv- post that he was holding a working meeting of Ukraine as
eries, which occurred in June and July, it sent with Javier La Rosa, the president of Chevron
no less than 3.6mn barrels of diluted crude oil Venezuela. He noted that the US major had a reason to
(DCO) to Europe. (It swapped 3mn barrels, or been active in Venezuela for a century and said reconsider policy
more than 83% of the total, with Spain’s Rep- he expected the meeting to be fruitful.
sol, which owns complex refineries that are His words were exultant: “In the coming toward Caracas.
more capable of handling this heavy feedstock.) hours, we will sign contracts to promote the
The second round of deliveries then began in development of joint ventures and oil produc-
November. tion; as we have always done, in the terms estab-
lished in the Constitution and other Venezuelan
OFAC issues GL 41 laws. NOW TO PRODUCE!!!”
And now, there has been an even bigger devel- The following day, Maduro added in a sepa-
opment with respect to sanctions relief. On rate Twitter post that El Aissami expected all of
November 26, the US government announced the contracts between PdVSA and Chevron to
that it had granted Chevron permission to be signed within the next few days.

P6 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 48 01•December•2022