Hess sheds US operations to bank on Guyana’s oil amid global crude battle

The price of oil on the international market has in recent days plummeted to its lowest in two decades and is projected to dip as low as US$20 per barrel, but this has not daunted ExxonMobil Guyana’s partner Hess Corporation, which despite drastically shedding its US operations, continues with its investments in Guyana unabated.
The company on Tuesday last said it has revised its capital investments downward by 25 per cent or US$2.2 billion.
The company has six rigs running in the Bakken Shale in the US, but plans to shed five of them by the end of May, it said in a statement.
The company said too it would also defer most discretionary exploration and offshore drilling, but that won’t apply to Guyana, indicating that exploration, appraisal, and development will continue in this country’s prolific offshore, where the company has made 16 discoveries in the Stabroek Block along with block operator ExxonMobil and China’s CNOOC, another partner.
The company’s Guyana investment, along with ExxonMobil’s, has been described as “a clear sky amid the stormy conditions of uncertain oil demand and battered crude prices.
Investment bank Goldman Sachs had recently pronounced that Hess Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Greg Hill has noted that a third development in the Stabroek Block, would likely be sanctioned soon after results of the recent national election are finalised.
The Stabroek partners have, to date, made 16 discoveries offshore Guyana, and project five offshore developments in the country by 2025 that will produce more than 750,000 bpd.
First oil was achieved in December from the Liza Field, the ExxonMobil-led consortium’s first find in the country’s offshore in 2015.