Total authorized to conduct an oil exploration campaign

/ Oil & Gas / Tuesday, 30 October 2018 06:49

Total group “just got the prefectural decree allowing it to begin its explorations in the territorial waters of Guyana,” said the territorial community of Guyana (CTG) in a statement. “The decree was taken and issued to Total”, confirmed the directorate-general of services of the CTG.

The head of external relations at Total Exploration & Production French Guiana, the applicant company of the opening of the mining work, has confirmed the signing of this decree on the local information site Guyaweb and added that the said decree would be the subject of a publication in the next days.

According to Total Exploration & Production French Guiana SAS, this company aims in a first step to drill an exploration well in the central part of the permit Guyane Maritime from the end of 2018 beginning of 2019 and over a period of 4 months. Five holes have already been drilled between 2012 and 2013 in the South-eastern part of this permit but weren’t successful.

In the North-Western part of the perimeter, “the central area has never been drilled,” noted, at the end of September, the report of the public Investigation Commission on this new request for the opening of offshore mining works.

“The studies conducted by Total between 2014 and 2015, incorporating all the data collected, allow you to highlight an interesting exploration potential in the central area of the permit”, had again recalled the report of the Commission.

In the course of this investigation that took place between July 16 and August 23, 7 173 people out of 7 183 opposed to this drilling at sea, 8 had undefined opinions, and 2 were supportive.

The Investigation Commission had issued a positive notice on this drilling request campaign with three recommendations: “re-activate the Monitoring Committee and Coordination (SCC) on oil in French Guyana”, “establish strict guidelines on the procedures of sludge disposal in the ocean and the treatment of toxic sludge” and “implement effective monitoring by the public authority responsible of these disposals and treatments of toxic sludge”.

The CTG, fully supportive of the work, pointed out that the signing of this decree embodies an agreement of partnership with “the oil group, which sets the mobilization of €10 million by the latter for the benefit of the local economy”, an agreement which was subject “to the approval of the drilling project”.

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