Publicise
Ryder Scott gas audit
By Keino Swamber
Trinidad Express, South Bureau
Port Spain
Petroleumworldtt.com
08 26 07
Oilfields
Workers' Trade Union president general Errol
Mc Leod is challenging the government to
make public the Ryder Scott natural gas audit that
said the
nation only has 12 years of reserves left.
Speaking on Tuesday at a post-budget forum hosted
by the Oilfield Workers' Trade Union and the Co-operative
Credit Union League of Trinidad and Tobago Limited
(CCULT), Mc Leod said he believed the report will
confirm what the union's position has been on the
state of the energy reserves in Trinidad and Tobago.
"The Ryder Scott report, or certainly, the
important indications of its content, had been
known for a long time," Mc Leod told the audience
at the OWTU headquarters, Circular Road, San Fernando.
Mc Leod, who earlier this year had said the nation's
gas reserves would last another nine years, said
it was ridiculous for Prime Minister Patrick Manning
to juxtapose the details of a similar report in
1974 with the recent report.
"Don't
tell me there was a 1974 position which suggested
that our reserves to production
ratio was eight years and it did not run out so
that in 2007 a reserves to production ratio of
12 years ought to not disturb my nerves.
"In
1974 oil was still king. Gas was not given the
extreme importance that it is today given.
Nobody was too worried about the reserves to production
ratio being eight years in 1974.
"We
certainly did not have the type of commitments
we have now to supply 70 per cent of the US requirement
for LNG."
Mc Leod said he was severely criticised when he
suggested on May 1 that Trinidad and Tobago's gas
reserves, based on current levels of production
and usage, would last only until 2016.
He said the release of the Ryder Scott report
was politically well timed.
Said
McLeod: "Those who are more educated
than I am would tell you that 75 per cent of assertions
or approaches in politics has to do with timing.
"The
release of some aspects of this report was timed
very deliberately to deal with a number
of issues that are now coming to the fore.
"The
first public response to the leaks in the report
you should see the prime minister how
he was responding to the story that gas is going
to run out. I have not panicked and I will not
panic because I think I understand the game."
He
added: "I am concerned however about how
we are going to deny Trinidad and Tobago's revenues
for development by our offering additional incentives
to those upon whom we are made to depend to prove
up more reserves."
Trinidad
Express
Friday, August 24th 2007
Copyright
©2007 Trinidad Express. All Rights Reserved.
