Guyana’s VP says work on gas pipeline studies will begin this year

Bharrat Jagdeo, Vice-President of Guyana, said earlier this week that the government intended to carry out several studies this year in order to move forward with a gas-to-power (GTP) scheme.

Speaking to reporters on February 9, Jagdeo said that Georgetown would carry out several studies, including an environmental impact assessment (EIA), for the project before the end of 2021. He did not say exactly when work would begin or which organisations would conduct the studies, but he did stress that the government would make additional information on its plan to use associated gas from the offshore Stabroek block as fuel for electricity generation public.

He also said that the scheme, which will entail the construction of a pipeline and a 300-MW thermal power plant (TPP), would carry a price tag of $500-800mn. The exact cost will depend on factors such as the size of the pipeline and the extent of the geotechnical surveys needed, he stated. “Then when we go out to tender, that is the time we will know the actual cost of it,” he was quoted as saying by Stabroek News.

The vice-president went on to say that the switch to domestically produced gas might bring the price of electric power down to $0.03-0.06 per kWh for Guyanese consumers. “You are looking at a significant reduction in energy cost. [It’s] huge,” he said. “We are working through the numbers, and the project is still in the preparatory stage. We are just doing studies so these are just estimates now, but this is the magnitude of the studies.”

Jagdeo also stated that the government had decided where the 160-km pipeline linking the Stabroek block to shore would make landfall. He named the site as Wales, a port facility on the West Bank of the Demerara river, but did not say whether work on the pipe would begin before the end of the year as previously discussed.