Govt. will not tolerate flaring troubles on future Stabroek Block ships

Govt. will not tolerate flaring troubles on future Stabroek Block ships – Bharrat

May 03, 2021 News

Kaieteur News – The recent flaring troubles in the Stabroek Block onboard the Liza Destiny, Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) vessel, will not be tolerated by the current administration, much less a recurrence on the Liza Unity and Prosperity vessels, which is set to arrive in Guyana later in the year and the Prosperity to arrive in 2024.
The dire warning was given last week by Minister of Natural Resources and the Environment, Vickram Bharrat. During a recent interview, the Minister announced that the US oil-major ExxonMobil has since dropped the German manufacturer for its troubled Flash Gas Compressor which has been plaguing the Liza Destiny, in favour of its American counterpart, General Electric.

Natural Resources Minister, Vickram Bharrat

Calling the recent troubles with the gas compressor that substantially curtailed operations on April 11, last, “unfortunate”, Minister Bharrat was nonetheless adamant “it is not something that the Government of Guyana wants. It is not something that we will tolerate.”
Defects to the flash gas compressor in April last forced ExxonMobil Guyana to slash production by some 60,000 barrels per day, in order to maintain safe operations and not flare above pilot levels. The company has since removed and flown the defective part to Houston Texas, and not Germany, as had obtained the previous time the flash gas compressor experienced problems and had to be removed and repaired.
The device malfunctioned for a fourth time while it was being monitored following its reinstallation in early March. Kaieteur News would have reported that a gas leak had been detected.
Lamenting the state of affairs, since “it is affecting production and worse yet, it is causing damage to the environment by the flaring of gas,” Minister Vickram disclosed, “we’re hoping that the matter can be resolved, or the compressor, that is, can be fixed as early as possible.”
He expressed that while ExxonMobil has a commitment to a timeframe of two to three months to have the defective gas compressor be repaired, “we are hoping too, that when it is fixed and returned, that we don’t have a reoccurring issue.”
As such, he disclosed, “this has now forced us to enter into engagements with Exxon to ensure that the Unity FPSO that is coming later in this year, and then Prosperity in early 2024, that we don’t have this issue with those FPSOs.”
He used the occasion to reiterate, “Those FPSOs are almost double the capacity of Liza Destiny.”
Speaking to the change by ExxonMobil with regard to the company to effect the repairs, the Minister disclosed that “we have gotten that assurance that General Electric will be used as the manufacturer, to ensure that the compressor, there is not a recurring problem on those FPSOs.”
Speaking to the urgency of the matter Minister Bharrat reminded that based on current projections, “we were hoping to have about 10 FPSOs offshore Guyana by 2027.”
He said with the recent announcement of another discovery in the Urau-2 Well, “that is more of a realisation.” Accordingly, the Minister noted, “we are well on track to be producing close to or a little over one million barrels of oil per day in another five to six years; So that is the good news.”
ExxonMobil on Friday last held its first quarter earnings call for shareholders and investors and boasted of reduced emissions from their operations globally while completely ignoring the flaring troubles experienced in the Stabroek Block operations.
Addressing the shareholders on Friday, Chairman of the Board of Directors, Darren Woods, focused instead on the production aspect of the Stabroek Block producing field to report that compared to the previous quarter, the crude coming out of the Stabroek Block was up 70 percent. He concluded by telling shareholders that the Guyana resource basin provides “a very rich set of opportunities.”
Further to this, he told investors that compared to 2016, the company last year saw its emissions down 20 percent and that ExxonMobil met the methane and flaring reductions it committed to in 2018 and even established an aggressive emission reduction plans through 2025.
He said this puts the company on a trajectory consistent with the goals of the Paris agreement.
Significantly, the Chairman in his report never mentioned the flaring and gas leak problems that were encountered in recent weeks in the Stabroek Block.
It was the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Hess Corporation, John Hess, who last week spilled the proverbial beans on the Stabroek Block operations when he disclosed that on April 11, last, oil production was curtailed for several days after a gas leak was detected in the Flash Gas Compressor’s discharge silencer onboard the Liza Destiny FPSO.