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Addressing concerns about its volume of natural gas flared to date, ExxonMobil yesterday assured that it was working fervently to fix problems with its compressor equipment offshore and said that the lessons learned will be applied to its next Floating Production Storage and Offloading vessel, as well as future projects.

“The current situation is a temporary, unplanned event related to project startup. Across our operations, ExxonMobil has programmes in place to improve operations integrity, thus reducing downtime and upsets that can result in flaring. Additionally, we are capturing lessons so we can apply to the Liza Unity and other projects moving forward,” the company’s Public and Government Affairs Officer Deedra Moe said in response to questions from the Stabroek News on the issue.

“We are doing all we can to repair the equipment safely in order to complete final commission of the system. As we have said, we have also reduced crude oil production to lessen the amount of gas being flared. ExxonMobil’s commitment to minimizing the environmental impact of its projects is reflected by our design of the Liza Destiny and Liza Phase 1 project. Our operations in Guyana will not utilize routine flaring,” Moe also assured.

The last Sunday Stabroek reported that as a result of persistent compressor problems, production at the Liza-1 has plummeted from 80,000 barrels per day (bpd) to now between 25,000 and 30,000 bpd as the company restricted flaring to no more than 15 million cubic feet of natural gas per day.

It followed reports that at the Liza-1 operations, some 9 billion cubic feet of natural gas was flared and a number of persons as well as global environmental and human rights organisation, the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), pointed to the effects of the greenhouse gas emissions on the environment, as they condemned the act.

As it flayed Exxon for the large volume of flaring, CIEL called on the company to heed environmental pollution warnings and immediately stop the flaring, while adding that Guyanese should press for a pausing of works offshore and let ExxonMobil first answer “fundamental questions about its commitment to the environment in the country” while assessing its capacity to monitor the works offshore.

It was EPA Director Dr Vincent Adams who had updated the public on the issue and also stated that the company had informed him that it was taking the decision to reduce flaring and was mulling sending the equipment out of the country.

The announcement of the steep drop in production came even as it was anticipated that by the middle of this month production would have reached Liza-1’s peak 120,000 bpd target.

“They have encountered additional issues with the compressor valves and are mulling taking it out of the country because [the] current COVID-19 [pan