Page 9 - LatAmOil Week 14 2021

LatAmOil TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO LatAmOil

Ecopetrol aims to acquire 51.4% of ISA’s equity (Photo: NiQuan Energy)

NiQuan’s GTL plant reports explosion

AN explosion has been reported at the recently also cause problems for the plant’s reforming
launched gas-to-liquids (GTL) plant owned by unit. “The plant has to come down before the
NiQuan Energy Trinidad Ltd (NETL), a subsid- wax can move in that pipeline, or that will be the
iary of US-based NiQuan Energy. end of everything in NiQuan. We [are] trying to
According to local press reports, the blast save the reformer,” he commented.
occurred on the morning of April 7. It did not The GTL plant is in Point-a-Pierre, about 50
cause any deaths or injuries, but it did spark a km south of Port of Spain on the west coast of the
fire. First responders were able to contain the island of Trinidad, at the site of the Petrotrin oil
blaze, and Trinidad and Tobago’s Ministry of refinery. NETL launched the facility last month,
National Security said later in the day that there after finishing construction last autumn and
was “no active danger at present to life or prop- proceeding with commissioning in December.
erty in the immediate vicinity.” According to previous reports, the plant has
On April 8, the Ministry of Energy and a design capacity of 2,400 barrels per day (bpd).
Energy Industries revealed that it had begun Diesel fuel will account for 80% of its output and
setting up a technical team to investigate the naphtha for the remaining 20%.
accident. It also attributed the explosion to a NiQuan has been active in Trinidad and
unspecified component failure. Tobago since 2016, when it arranged to acquire
Meanwhile, Trinidad Express quoted a plant the physical plant, property and equipment of
employee as saying on April 7 that the blast may World GTL Trinidad for $10mn plus $25mn
have been the result of a “build-up of wax” inside worth of non-convertible preference shares. It
the pipelines that lead to the facility’s hydroc- finalised the deal in 2018 under an agreement
racking unit. The employee, who was not iden- with the state-owned Petrotrin refinery, the
tified by name, said that the explosion might holder of World GTL Trinidad’s debentures. ™

NGC hopes to continue gas talks with MHTL

NATIONAL Gas Co. (NGC) of Trinidad and MHTL, a subsidiary of Switzerland’s Proman
Tobago said at the weekend that it hoped to Group, had been hoping to strike a deal with
continue natural gas supply talks with Metha- NGC on the renewal of a supply agreement that
nol Holdings (Trinidad) Ltd (MHTL), despite expired on April 1.
the failure of the latest round of negotiations However, the two sides were unable to come
between the parties. to terms.

Week 14 08•April•2021 www. NEWSBASE .com P9