TT renegotiates multi-billion dollar natural gas project with Venezuela

T&T renegotiating multi-billion dollar gas project

The Trinidad and Tobago government is in the process of re-negotiating the TT$6.3 billion Caribbean Gas Chemical Ltd (CGCL) plant in La Brea, after accusing the former administration of agreeing to a number of items that raised cause for concern and potentially exposed Trinidad and Tobago to billions of dollars worth of claims.

The plant is a collaboration amongst Japan’s Mitsubishi Corporation, Mitsubishi Gas Chamicals, Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, the National Gas Company (NGC) and Massy Group.

Minister in the Ministry of the Attorney General and Legal Affairs, Stuart Young told Parliament that during the 2010-15 period of the coalition People’s Partnership government of Kamla Persad Bissessar, the true position with respect to the availability and supply of natural gas to the hydrocarbon downstream industry was not provided.

He said since 2010, there were serious gas curtailment issues that affected the downstream gas industry and these curtailments were not as the result of maintenance, either scheduled or unscheduled.

He told parliamentarians that soon after coming into office in September last year, the Keith Rowley government was immediately faced with several matters relating to the project, including have to deal with billions of dollars in claims, from downstreamers who claimed that they were not getting their full daily contractual gas supplies from the NGC as a result of the ongoing curtailment situation.