Is Dragon deal on life support?

THE EDITOR: The geopolitical risks in Venezuela are a serious problem for TT and no matter how you try to sugarcoat it, the Dragon gas deal – given the reimposing of US sanctions – seems unrealistic in the foreseeable future.

The US’ decision last Wednesday left government and the prime minister trying very hard to insist the dragon deal was not affected. Dr Rowley is quoted as saying, “...we have some things in place which are not directly affected by that (the sanctions). But that doesn’t mean it wouldn’t be affected sometime in the future, as the goalpost keeps changing.”

He added, “if it does not happen this year and it happens ten years from now, then that is a good thing.” However, I beg to differ. We don’t have ten years to wait on this gas, our energy sector needs it now and we can not be giving out mixed signals like this.

The US's decision affects us and implies that the special amended licence given to the TT government on October 17, will be affected. This the reality and we need to wake up and smell the coffee.

The Biden administration has reimposed energy sanctions on Venezuela and although our government wants to be optimistic and state that the amended OFAC licence issued last October is valid until October 31, 2025, and that Shell and NGC can continue to explore the opportunity to produce and export natural gas from the Dragon field.

However, this doesn’t look feasible with the reimposing of energy sanctions on Venezuela. The sanctions make this more difficult and again doesn’t look like it will get off the ground. We all must recognise that Shell will have great difficulty in implementing this project in a sanctioned environment.

Doing business with Venezuela is difficult already and in this sanctions environment, it is even more difficult, and we can see this deal fizzle out.

The cost of this deal could be in the region of hundreds of millions or even billions given the kind of infrastructure needed for this maritime cross-border gas extraction.

I can’t understand why we continue to play games with the people by keeping hope alive.

There is an election in the US in November and again,, if the administration changes, then this deal also has little chance of succeeding with an incoming Trump administration. We are really in a terrible state where we have gone from a position where the Dragon gas would not affect our gas supply to one where we are now very dependent on this deal staying in effect although its survival is very much out of our hands.

NEIL GOSINE

Port of Spain