Early last year, the APNU+AFC Administration received and reviewed an Oil and Gas Master Plan “voluntarily” developed and financed by Mitsubishi Corporation and Chiyoda Corporation, in collaboration with the Government of Japan.
Since that time, the Government has made no public announcements about the way forward on the Master Plan. Be that as it may, this news agency was able to make contact with Foreign Affairs Minister, Carl Greenidge on the matter yesterday. He revealed that the Government is in favour of the plan.
In fact, Greenidge said that the Japanese trio has advised Government through the plan that several areas of “great potential” should be explored. These include factories to produce Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG); refinery plants such as those to manufacture urea, ammonia and ethanol; and a Gas to Power Plant.
The Minister said, “So what has happened since that time is that they have funded phase one of the Oil and Gas Plan which seeks to identify a number of areas that we could probably develop based on our needs and priorities…They also said that we should explore the economics of these areas.”
Greenidge noted that the feasibility studies of projects in the said areas will start by March 2020. The Foreign Affairs Minister said that the Japanese have raised no objection to issuing the money for the feasibility studies as grants. The Minister said that funding for this process will be made available by the Japan Corporation Centre for Petroleum (JCCP).
“So this is well underway and we are pleased with the progress taking place. And this is all grants,” expressed Greenidge.
The Minister also noted that the Government of Japan is funding the technical work associated with the plan, which also includes the creation of a road map towards balancing Guyana’s oil and gas future with its ‘green’ development agenda.
Research indicates that Japan is the largest LNG buyer in the world, importing almost 84 million tonnes in 2017. It also has a booming urea, ammonia and ethanol industry, as well as an abundance of expertise in building infrastructure for power generation. It is has been hunting new markets for the last seven years.
