First oil production vessel sails for Guyana
Liza Destiny, which will be the first oil production vessel to be located in Guyana’s waters has left Singapore, according to a release yesterday from ExxonMobil.
Christened on June 22, 2019 by First Lady Sandra Granger, the Floating, Production, Storage and Offloading (FPSO) vessel is expected in Guyana’s waters in September as the country readies for first oil in 2020.
The Liza Destiny has a production capacity up to 120,000 barrels of oil per day and an overall storage volume of 1.6 million barrels.
Exxon says that during normal operations, there will be at least 80 persons living and working onboard the vessel. Twenty-four Operations and Maintenance Technicians, who are currently being trained in Canada, will return in 2020 to support work on the Liza Destiny.
Exxon says this FPSO is a significant component of the Liza Phase 1 development which involves four undersea drill centres with 17 production wells.
“We have more than 1000 Guyanese working for the project here, and the team is continuing to do an incredible job. Their work includes everything from completions of the initial wells for production to laying pipelines and infrastructure on the sea floor to eventually connect up to the Liza Destiny for production. We’re proud of the work being done each and every day, and want to thank everyone involved for their focus on safety and keeping the protection of the environment top of mind in all that they do,” Country Manager Rod Henson said in the Exxon release.
Meanwhile, the helideck aboard the Liza Destiny has been inspected by the Guyana Civil Aviation Authority’s (GCAA) Chief Air Navigations and Aerodromes Inspector, Adrian Bassier. This was done in Singapore.
A release from the GCAA yesterday said that the inspection was done in collaboration with the Ghana Civil Aviation Authority (Ghana CAA) which has qualified inspectors and technical expertise in the licensing and certification of helidecks. The release said that the inspection in Singapore was done to ensure compliance with Guyana’s Civil Aviation regulations and the International Civil Aviation Organisation’s (ICAO) Standards and Recommended Practices (SARPs). The inspection was done while the vessel was in the shipyard so that any irregularity could be addressed before it left the port.
The release said that the collaboration between Guyana and Ghana for the certification process derived from a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed between GCAA and Ghana CAA in December 2018, in Nairobi, Kenya, at the ICAO Air Services Negotiation (ICAN) event.
The MOU provides for technical cooperation and sharing of expertise and knowledge in the areas of civil aviation between the two Civil Aviation Authorities. The release said that the GCAA is presently building the capacity of its Inspectors to address the needs of the emerging Oil and Gas Sector in Guyana.
The inspector from Ghana who participated in the inspection was delegated by the Director General of the GCAA, Lt. Col. Egbert Field to perform the functions on behalf of the Authority. This is a normal practice when a State’s civil aviation authority does not have the requisite capacity for an inspection or certification exercise.