Maxar Technologies, a provider of space solutions and geospatial intelligence, has secured a three-year contract with the government of Guyana, for the provision of environmental monitoring services for both offshore and terrestrial applications.
Maxar said Guyana’s Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) will use its services and technology, which leverages Maxar’s very-high resolution optical satellites, to monitor drilling rigs for regulatory compliance and safety, and to identify potential spills.
Also, the Guyana Forestry Commission will combine several Maxar capabilities to track illegal deforestation, protect mangroves and safeguard the country’s biodiversity.
Guyana has, over the past several years, become a deepwater oil and gas exploration and production hotspot, with ExxonMobil and its partners discovering around 11 billion barrels of oil in the Stabroek offshore block, and putting two FPSOs into production, with more to come in the coming years.
In the third quarter of 2022, ExxonMobil’s first two sanctioned offshore Guyana projects, Liza Phase 1 and Liza Phase 2, were producing above design capacity and achieved an average of nearly 360,000 barrels of oil per day.
A third project, Payara, is expected to start-up by the end of 2023, and a fourth project, Yellowtail, is expected to start-up in 2025.
ExxonMobil expects Guyana’s oil production capacity to be more than one million barrels a day by the end of the decade.