Young: Progress on gas from Dragon, Manatee fields

ENERGY Minister Stuart Young has said progress is being made on the licence for the Dragon gas field, which involves a US$1 billion deal between Trinidad and Tobago and Venezuela, and bringing in gas from the Loran-Manatee field, which straddles TT and Venezuelan territorial waters.

He was responding in the House of Representatives on Wednesdayquestions from Opposition Whip David Lee about the Dragon gas deal with Venezuela and accessing natural gas from the Manatee field, which lies in TT's waters.

Young said he was not surprised that the Opposition UNC does not understand how the energy sector works.

He reminded Lee, the opposition's shadow energy minister, that the House's standing orders forbid asking questions in Parliament on which information is easily accessible in the public domain.

He said both the issues Lee raised fitted that criterion.

"It is a matter of public knowledge, both in Trinidad and internationally, that almost two months ago, the Ministry of Energy and Energy Industries published an official statement on its website in October 2023 (about the extension of the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) licence for the Dragon gas deal)."

The US$1 billion deal was signed between TT and Venezuela in August 2018. Those involved included energy giant Shell, Venezuela’s state oil company PDVSA, and the National Gas Company (NGC).

The Dragon deal will see TT developing the field, which is estimated to produce approximately 150 million standard cubic feet of gas a day. The gas will be imported through a billion-dollar pipeline to the Hibiscus platform off the northwest coast of TT. The platform is jointly owned by the Government, NGC and Shell.

The deal was left in limbo after the US imposed sanctions on Venezuela in 2019.

On January 24, the Prime Minister announced that the US had lifted the sanctions to allow TT to extract gas from Venezuela. This waiver came after almost four years of lobbying led by Dr Rowley and supported by other Caricom leaders.

Rowley said the waiver came with stipulations, one being a two-year licence with an optimistic view of an extension and priority given to Caribbean countries, except Cuba.

In October, OFAC offered an extension of the licence it issued to TT to access natural gas from the Dragon gas field and the ability to pay for that gas in different ways.

Young announced the extension of the licence to October 31, 2025 at a news conference on October 17.

He said the extension also allows Government to pay for gas from the field in “fiat currency, as well as US dollars, as well as (Venezuelan bolivares), as well as via humanitarian measures.”

While all of this is public knowledge, Young found it curious that the UNC was unaware of this.

He invited Lee "to brush himself up on current affairs in the energy sector."

Young said,"We are in the process of finalising the negotiation for the Dragon licence and it is only upon finalisation and the production of gas does the measurement and the amount of money to be paid arise."

He added that the UNC was not aware that last month Shell announced it had awarded a contract to McDermott to build the infrastructure to bring natural gas to TT from Manatee.

Young reiterated this happened as a result of negotiations with Venezuela to delink Manatee from the Loran-Manatee field, which straddles the TT-Venezuela maritime border.

He was optimistic that TT would receive the first gas from Manatee in 2026.

Earlier in the sitting, Young reminded MPs about the closure of the Yara plant at Pt Lisas in December 2019. He said the plant was one of the first built on the Pt Lisas Industrial Estate, and is decades old and carbon-intensive.

Young also said the Methanx Titan methanol plant and Nutrien's Ammonia #3 plant were idled in March 2020 and August 2022 respectively.

But he added, "I think the country can stand by very shortly for news with respect to the Titan plant, as I believe it will soon restart."