Dear Editor,
The Minister for Natural Resources, like Christopher Columbus, has discovered that Guyana’s petroleum legislation allows for retrieval of information generated by the oil companies; see ‘Govt. demands immediate information on oil discoveries in new PSA’ and ‘Exxon must provide daily drill data, ROV images’, both in Kaieteur News (December 9, 2025).
Minister Vickram Bharrat referenced section 25 (1) of the Petroleum Activities Act, number 17 of 2023, as if this was innovative. Guyana has had this power since the passing of Petroleum (Exploration and Production) Act cap. 65:04 in 1997. In the older Act, the power to obtain information from prospecting and production operations is in section 65 and in the newer Act in section 92. Ever since the dubious petroleum concessions granted by President Ramotar just before the 2015 General and Regional Elections, the government does not seem to have made much use of these powers to collect and use the enormous quantities of geological and petrochemical data, from seismic surveys and from well drillings. Not even the maps of the offshore seismic lines can be accessed now via the home page of the Petroleum Management Program of the Ministry of Natural Resources (see https://petroleum.gov.gy/[1]).
Yet during this year, there have been seismic survey activities; for example, ‘Shearwater GeoServices to conduct 4D survey offshore Guyana for ExxonMobil,’ OilNow.gy, February 26, 2025; ‘Exxon seismic survey at Stabroek Bloc to continue through 2025’, OilNow.gy, April 17, 2025; ‘Guyana gov’t. nears deal on major 3D seismic survey to guide future licensing – Gossai’, OilNow.gy, December 10, 2025. The record is uninspiring. ExxonMobil Guyana has generally been unwilling to release even the simplest data on oil wells which were dry or were non-commercial in resource quantity, for the three offshore tracts for which it is the operator:
We therefore call once again on the Government to make Guyana’s oil well data public. Article 9 of the 2016 PSA requires the following, inter alia: “(a) The Contractor shall, at all times while this Agreement is in force, maintain and submit to the Minister in accordance with the
provisions of the Act and the Regulations, the Petroleum Production Licence and this Agreement, full and accurate reports, records, returns and accounts of Petroleum Operations in the Contract Area. (b) All data, well logs, maps, magnetic tapes, cuts of cores and cutting samples and all other geological and geophysical information obtained by the Contractor in the course of carrying out Petroleum Operations hereunder and all geological, technical, financial and economic reports, studies and analyses generated in relation thereto (hereinafter referred to as “Petroleum Data”) shall be submitted to the Minister in accordance with the Regulations.”