ExxonMobil conducts several rounds of emergency training for 2022

…regional response team to arrive for further trainiExxonMobil’s local subsidiary

Esso Exploration and Production Guyana Limited (EEPGL) has launched a two-day emergency response training exercise for its staff, something that the company does and plans to continue doing on a regular basis.
The training was done at the Marriott Hotel and saw EEPGL working with The Response Group, a United States company specialising in crisis management. Among the areas that the training will cover are responses to different levels of crisis in EEPGL’s offshore activities, such as oil spills.
EEPGL Public Information Officer Janelle Persaud stressed that while a crisis incident has never happened in Guyana’s waters and Exxon was taking care that it did not, training for its incident management team was still necessary.
“What we have here is a two-day exercise for the incident management team, that’s a group within ExxonMobil that responds to various types of incidents and is triggered depending on the severity of the incident,” Persaud said. Wednesday’s session dealt with gas leaks and fires.
“Thankfully, we’ve never had to use it. But we like to say here at ExxonMobil that our approach to emergency response is first being prevention, so everything we put in place to ensure an incident does not happen. But in the unlikely chance that it does, we have to be prepared.”
She explained that several similar training sessions were done during this year, and another major training exercise would be done by this year end. According to Persaud, EEPGL’s incident management team also has the regional response team to back them up in real life. Additionally, the regional response team will be arriving in Guyana for the final training session by this year end.
“The regional response team, it varies depending on the role. So, we have folks who are environment related. You have folks, different types of engineers, safety focused, medical professionals, media and communications, logistics.”
“Of course, when it comes to an ExxonMobil response to an event, those are very different. And I know oil spills is one of those that people talk about as a thing of concern. And so for that, you will have access to equipment that can come into the country within hours,” Persaud explained.
There is also a National Oil Spill Contingency Plan, which was handed over in October 2020 by the Civil Defence Commission (CDC) to Prime Minister, Brigadier (Retired) Mark Phillips. The plan was months in the making and involved the input of many key stakeholders including the Maritime Administrative Department (MARAD); Guyana Energy Agency (GEA); Environmental Protection Agency (EPA); the Department of Energy; Guyana Geology and Mines Commission (GGMC); Guyana Defence Force (GDF) and the CDC.
The National Emergency Oil Spill Plan was crafted with valuable inputs also from the Guyana Marine Conservation Society, Guyana Wildlife Conservation and Management Commission, Legal Affairs Ministry, Shipping Association of Guyana, ExxonMobil, Tullow, GuyOil, Repsol, Shell, GAICO Construction and other stakeholders.
The United States has also been providing tactical and operational support to Guyana, when it comes to advancing and fortifying this country’s national response to oil spills. In June, the CDC provided a recap on the series of training and support provided to 231 persons from over 30 agencies by the United States Coast Guard in building capacity to handle such matters.
From June 2021 to April 2022, these efforts have addressed gaps in Guyana’s management of any oil spills. (G3) ng by year end