ExxonMobil eager to make final investment in US$12.9B oil project by 2024 first quarter

Oct 18, 2023 ExxonMobil, News, Oil & Gas

Kaieteur News – ExxonMobil Guyana Limited’s Country Manager, Alistair Routledge disclosed yesterday that his company is expected to make a final investment decision (FID) for its sixth project in the oil-rich Stabroek Block by the first quarter of 2024. During a press engagement yesterday, Routledge said the sixth project called Whiptail is expected to cost about US$13B.

Routledge said, “We did in fact submit the field development plan (for Whiptail) to the Ministry of Natural Resources last week on Friday, the 13^th of October and so that has commenced the process on all the regulatory fronts. As you are aware, we started the process for the environmental permit in fact in late 2022. So all the permitting processes are now actively engaged.”

Routledge said Exxon also engaged the Natural Resources Ministry before the formal submission of the field development plan (FDP) to ensure officials were apprised of the concepts for the project ahead of time and their feedback was adequately reflected in those documents.

“When that project comes on stream by the end of 2027, that will bring six projects in the Stabroek Block on board by 2027, and will bring the installed capacity of production facilities in the country to above 1.2 million barrels of oil per day. It is really quite outstanding to think that within eight years of first production Guyana could achieve over 1.2 million barrels of oil per day,” the Exxon official said.

A map showing the location of the Whiptail Project offshore Guyana.

According to project documents, Whiptail will be capable of producing 250,000 barrels of crude per day (bpd). The floating production, storage, and offloading (FPSO) vessel will have an oil storage capacity of 2 million barrels. It will be able to offload crude to a tanker every three to six days, once the project is producing optimally.

Currently, Exxon and its partners in the Stabroek Block have two projects, Liza Phase One and Liza Phase Two, producing about 400,000 barrels of oil per day.

A third project, Payara is set to come on stream by year-end and add another 220,000 barrels of oil to Guyana’s oil output.

The fourth sanctioned development, Yellowtail, is expected to come online in 2025 with a gross production capacity of approximately 250,000 barrels of oil per day.

Uaru, the fifth development on the Stabroek Block, is expected to start up in 2026 and have a production capacity of approximately 250,000 gross barrels of oil per day. These five projects alone are worth over US$40B.

Since the discovery of oil in 2015, Exxon and its partners have spent more than US$1.2B with Guyanese suppliers. Guyanese represent 69 percent of its workforce.