Heritage CEO highlights energy-sector challenges, opportunities

The CEO of Heritage Petroleum, Erik Keskula, has highlighted some challenges and opportunities facing the energy industry, emphasising investment in people and sustainable practices.

He identified the challenges as aging infrastructure, natural production decline in mature fields and shifting global market dynamics.

Keskula spoke at the energy conference hosted by the Energy Chamber of Trinidad and Tobago at the Hyatt Hotel in Port of Spain on February 11.

He said natural production decline is worsened by the high cost of maintaining aging infrastructure, which needs to be modernised so that new technologies, such as AI and machine learning, can be fully exploited.

“Much of the infrastructure that we have in Trinidad, especially onshore, is quite aged, and so many of the processes are manual,” Keskula said. “We do not really get the opportunity to leverage that technology. So as we invest in those assets, we need to modernise them.”

He highlighted the increasing complexity of reservoir exploration being done, “whether deep water, deeper horizons – where we are very encouraged with what Trinidad might have – or, as we push the structural and stratigraphic complexities, within our existing fields.”

Keskula was part of a panel chaired by Dr Thackwray Driver, president and CEO of the chamber.

Keskula outlined an approach centred on cost control, technological integration and partnerships to navigate the challenges.

“The first is obviously in our work processes, the addition of technology, but also ruthless prioritisation to ensure competitiveness and that we are working on our best margin opportunities,” he said.

“We do that by leveraging technology, whether remote monitoring of fields throughout southern Trinidad or offshore or using the latest technologies when we do our subsurface characterisation to ensure that we are targeting the best resources we can.”

Keskula stressed the need for enhanced oil recovery (EOR) techniques, improved asset management and collaboration with service providers and technology leaders to optimise production.

Despite the challenges, he highlighted opportunities.

“There is untapped potential in the deep, deeper horizons onshore and offshore Trinidad.

"But we also need to progress our contingent resources, resources in and around our existing fields that are not being developed.

“Heritage has committed to a 30 per cent reduction in methane emissions by 2030. Our first project delivered a 22 per cent reduction on those many emissions.

“So, we have adjusted our target to be, by 2026, a 30 per cent reduction. We have accelerated, and then we have also established a new target for 2030, when we want to achieve a 40 per cent reduction in our emission intensity.”

He stressed the need for continued research and development and investment in people.

“We have to continue to invest in people and show them that excitement and optimism so that students want to be in oil and gas, and those of us that are in here want to stay in oil and gas, because the future is very bright, those mature assets can be the bridge to the big green projects and deliver the growth for TT."

The other panellists included the executive director for Upstream, S&P Global Commodity Insights, Ricardo Bedregal; president and CEO of Touchstone Exploration, Paul Baay; executive vice-president of Macro Analysis & Advisory of Welligence Energy Analytics, Carlos Bellorin; and president, operations, of the Americas for Wood, Jesse Stanley.