Page 10 - LatAmOil Week 49 2022

LatAmOil GUYANA LatAmOil

Bank of Guyana says NRF’s

balance is nearing $1.4bn

THE Bank of Guyana (BoG) has said that two tranches of $200mn each. It is due to with-
the country’s Natural Resource Fund (NRF) draw a third tranche of about $207mn before the
reported a balance equivalent to nearly $1.4bn end of the year.
as of the end of November 2022. All of the money flowing into the sovereign
In a statement, the bank noted that the sov- wealth fund originates from exports of crude
ereign wealth fund’s balance had amounted to extracted from the Liza-1 and Liza-2 sections of
GYD290,108,241,000 ($1.39bn) as of Novem- Stabroek, an offshore block operated by a sub-
ber 30, 2022. It also noted that the government sidiary of ExxonMobil (US). These two sites are
had deposited some GYD36,934,316,000 currently Guyana’s only producing oilfields.
($174.243mn) in oil export earnings in the NRF ExxonMobil aims to bring the Payara sec-
in September. tion of Stabroek on stream in 2023, followed
Earnings from accumulated interest reached by Yellowtail in 2024 and Uaru in 2026. Under
GYD860,343,000 ($4.119mn), it added, while the terms of its production-sharing agreement
royalties stood at zero. (PSA), it must turn over 50% of all the crude it
Georgetown did not make any withdrawals extracts from Stabroek to the Guyanese govern-
from the NRF in November, it added. ment. Georgetown has been selling its share of
Guyana’s government is on track to see reve- production via a marketing agent.
nues from crude exports reach $1.247bn for the The NRF was officially established under the
full year of 2022. This will bring the country’s mandate of a law passed by Guyana’s Parliament
total oil earnings since the start of production at and signed by President Irfaan Ali in December
the Liza-1 field in December 2019 up to nearly 2021. Prior to that date, Guyana’s oil revenues
$1.855bn. Since Guyana made its first deposit in had been held in a special account by the US
the NRF, it has made only two withdrawals in Federal Reserve Bank of New York. ™

Extension of Wei-1 drilling deadline allows

CGX, Frontera to avoid relinquishment

FRONTERA Energy and its affiliate CGX because it stemmed from the failure of Shell
Energy, the two Canadian companies that have (UK) to release a drillship from a project off-
teamed up to explore and develop the Coren- shore Trinidad and Tobago, he stated.
tyne block offshore Guyana, will be able to avoid He also noted that the joint venture had
relinquishing part of their contract area despite taken the step of filing a notice of potential com-
their recent failure to meet a drilling deadline. mercial interest in recent months for its discov-
Orlando Cabrales, the CEO of Canada’s ery at Kawa-1, the first exploration well drilled
Frontera Energy, explained on December 1 that at Corentyne.
the joint venture partners had secured an exten- Under Guyana’s current legal regime, this
sion of their exploration period. CGX and Fron- notice gives the joint venture the option of
tera had previously been due to return a portion applying for a production licence at any time
of the block to state control if they did not spud within the following two-year period, he said.
their second well by November 27, 2022, but He did not say exactly when the partners had
CGX has been able to convince Georgetown to taken this step, but OilNOW.gy speculated that
push the deadline back to January 31, 2023, he they had probably done so in or around May of
said. CGX declared force majeure after learn- this year, when they confirmed the discovery of
ing that it would not be able to spud its second light crude oil and gas condensate at Kawa-1.
exploration well, Wei-1, on October 22 as sched- According to previous reports, the compa-
uled, Cabrales said. nies encountered 69 metres of net pay in the
Instead, it informed the Guyanese gov- Maastrichtian, Campanian, Santonian and
ernment that the delay was beyond its control Coniacian horizons of this first well.

P10 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 49 07•December•2022