Upstream gas suppliers have been asked to maintain a steady supply to national aggregations and the overall value chain.
Energy Minister Stuart Young made the call at the National Gas Company’s (NGC) Asset Integrity Report at the Hyatt Regency in Port of Spain on Tuesday.
Young said upstreamers such as Shell and BP would pull resources from the ground, and send the gas to the NGC or Atlantic LNG, where it would be processed and sent to downstream companies such as ammonia or petrochemical companies.
But he added that the priority for TT’s natural gas is to fuel power generation, which means that lower production from upstream would affect the downstream companies.
“If you have ten molecules coming from the upstream and you have ten in the middle, and the upstream (production) drops to five, then the maths wouldn’t maths, no matter how you sell it.”
The International Gas Union’s 2022 report indicated that TT had a reduction in production of LNG of 3.9 million tonnes (MT) owing to domestic gas shortages and a lack of backfill projects.
Young also reiterated at the event that there was no shortage of LPG or any other form of natural gas. He rubbished reports in a newspaper of an impending cooking-gas shortage amid shutdowns of specific plants.
“There is absolutely no natural-gas crisis. At no point in time was this responsible for anything to do with LPG. What you have heard this morning was about asset management.”
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