The UK's largest energy company BP Plc (NYSE: BP) has won a contract to market Guyana's share of crude oil produced over the next year from two offshore production platforms. According to the state's Ministry of Natural Resources, BP has agreed to market the state's share produced from the Liza Destiny and Liza Unity platforms at no charge per barrel, replacing Saudi Aramco's trading unit.
With ~11 billion barrels found to date Guyana is home to one of the largest oil discoveries over the last decade. U.S. oil and gas supermajor Exxon Mobil (NYSE: XOM) is one of the largest players in Guyana, and has been developing production in offshore Guyana at a pace that "far exceeds the industry average".
Exxon's two sanctioned offshore Guyana projects, Liza Phase 1 and Liza Phase 2, are now producing above design capacity and have already achieved an average of nearly 360K bbl/day of oil. The supermajor expects total production from Guyana to hit 800,000 barrels per day by 2025 and cross a million barrels per day by the end of this decade.
The company might even exceed that target: a month ago, Exxon announced it had made two more discoveries at the Sailfin-1 and Yarrow-1 wells in the Stabroek block offshore Guyana, bringing discoveries on the block to more than 30 since 2015.
Exxon is the operator of the Stabroek block where it holds a 45% interest while partners Hess Corp. (NYSE: HES) and Cnooc (OTCPK: CEOHF) hold a 30% and 25% interest, respectively. Through mid-year, the consortium produced crude worth $307 million in Guyana.
The group markets two types of crude: a medium to light sweet oil called Liza, and an even lighter grade called Unity Gold.
Currently, Exxon's total oil and gas production is well below record levels, averaging 3.7M boe/day at midyear, in-line with last year but nearly 9% below 4.1M boe/day set in 2016.
By Alex Kimani for Oilprice.com
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Alex Kimani is a veteran finance writer, investor, engineer and researcher for Safehaven.com. More