Govt hopes for Dragon Field sign-off

The sales agreement for natural gas produced from the Dragon Field will hopefully be signed “a month or two” Energy Ministry Franklin Khan has said.

Those negotiations are currently taking place between Shell Trinidad & Tobago Ltd, PDVSA- Venezuela’s state-owned oil and gas company, and the National Gas Company of Trinidad & Tobago, Khan told Newsday in a brief telephone interview.

Shell, for its part, is hoping that operations and production on Dragon will start in 2019/2020. “You must have aspirations; some (projects) will come on faster, others will take longer. But to be successful in this business you have to chase all the opportunities,” Shell TT Country Chair Derek Hudson told reporters after a luncheon hosted by the Energy Chamber at the Hilton Trinidad in St Ann’s yesterday.

He acknowledged that politics have come into play, especially considering the trade sanctions and personnel restrictions between Venezuela and the United States, but that Shell will never go counter to any stance taken by a government regarding contract negotiations.

“Politics is a way of life. All these things factor into how business takes place... we deal with these challenges all over the world,” Hudson said, although he noted that all US personnel have been removed from any negotiations for these projects.

Hudson also said Shell was committed to exploration activities in Trinidad in what he described as “the most intensive” thrust he had ever seen. He had a positive outlook for the energy sector in TT over the medium term, noting that in the current environment with low prices and strong competition, three of the biggest energy companies in the world have committed to investing billions of dollars in this country over the next few years.