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  4. David Campbell at the bpTT media introduction

David Campbell at the bpTT media introduction

Thank you for joining me today and for the opportunity to share more on what bpTT has been up to this year and what our plans are for 2023 and beyond.

 

I have had the opportunity to speak with one or two of you but I wanted to speak more fully about who I am and why I am excited about the Trinidad and Tobago business.

 

I’m now two months into my role and I’ve hit the ground running spending the last few weeks meeting the amazing people that run our operations here, understanding the business, meeting with government and community stakeholders and immersing myself into the wonderful culture of Trinidad and Tobago.

 

I have been amazed by the warmth and welcoming nature of your country and treated to some of the most amazing food, places and experiences, and there is still so much to do and see. 

 

A bit about me…I’ve worked with bp since 1984.

 

I started as a petroleum engineer in the UK and then went on to roles in the US and Mexico. I then transitioned to roles in trading and planning and then to leadership positions. I started my career as a petroleum engineer in the UK North Sea and then went on to roles in Alaska, Mexico and California before returning to London and roles in planning and oil trading.

 

I then progressed to roles focused on operations, including leadership roles in TNK-BP and North Sea and Iraq.

 

I was then returned to London to lead the office of the CEO.

 

After that I was president of bp Russia for eight years responsible for building and strengthening our relationship and businesses with Rosneft.

 

Which brings us to why we’re here today: I have the privilege to lead such a vibrant and exciting business.

 

What I bring to the Trinidad and Tobago business is extensive experience in both operations and leadership, as well as an understanding of the overall strategic direction of bp.

 

I’m excited about heading bp Trinidad and Tobago because of its importance both to this country as well as bp. To give you an indication of the importance of the Trinidad and Tobago business to bp, consider this:

 

We’ve invested about US$3.4 billlion in T&T between 2018 and 2022. And we expect to invest about US$800 million in 2023.

 

That investment has gone into projects including:

  • Matapal – which achieved first gas in 2021
  • Cassia C – we have just announced 1st gas. Cassia C is our largest facility to date and our first offshore compression facility and having seen the facility first hand I am amazed by its sheer scale and complexity and the fact that it will help us bring gas to market that would otherwise have been left in the ground.
  • We are also investing in projects that do not add production but that are critical to maintaining a business fit for the future. These include renewing our infrastructure such as replacing two of our key pipelines – our 12” pipeline that brings all of our liquids to our Galeota terminal for processing and our 6” pipeline that connects our Beachfield facility to the Galeota terminal. We have also upgraded our Beachfield gas receiving facilities and built new liquid processing facilities at the Galeota terminal. We are making these investments to be able to safely produce gas for decades to come.
  • More recently, we spudded the first of four wells of our current drilling programme on small pools on Mango and Savonette. This programme targets resources close to existing platforms and once successful, we will be able to bring on production by the end of this year and into early 2023.
  • We have also made significant progress on T&T’s first commercial scale solar project with our partners Lightsource BP and Shell and we hope in the near future to be able to take a final investment decision on the project and move forward with construction.

Investment is the greatest indicator of the confidence bp has in its T&T business, in addition we have focused on commercial arrangements – and on acquiring more acreage through bid rounds - which will lay a strong foundation for the future:

  • Following discussions with the Hon Prime Minister and Minister of Energy in London in September, we accelerated the sanction of our next development – Cypre
  • We recently renewed our gas supply contract with the National Gas Company which will secure future domestic gas supply for Trinidad and Tobago for the upcoming years
  • We have made significant progress with the government and our partners in Atlantic on new commercial agreements that will govern the future operations of Atlantic. This will simplify the commercial structures and underpin important future upstream investments.
  • We’ve submitted joint bids with Shell on the latest round of deepwater blocks and have been invited by the Government to negotiate terms for the exploitation of 4 blocks.
  • And we continue to work to maximise production and increase efficiency at our existing facilities.

These efforts have seen us manage declines in our base wells keeping them on production longer than expected.

 

Our teams here have delivered a lot this year, kept our operations running safely, built and delivered significant major projects, progressed important commercial negotiations and focused on winning capital for future investments such as Cypre and Angelin.

 

So what’s in store for next year?

 

  • We’re going to progress our Cypre project. This will move into the execute stage and will include seven wells and subsea trees tied back into bpTT’s existing Juniper platform via two new 14-kilometre flexible flowlines. Drilling is due to commence in 2023 and first gas from the facility is expected in 2025.  
  • We will complete drilling on our existing small pools programme and are evaluating opportunities to add additional drilling prospects to the programme.
  • We’re continuing to work on our infrastructure projects – the 12” offshore pipeline and the 6”onshore pipeline. The 12” line is expected to be completed in 2023 and the 6” in 2024. 
  • We are progressing the Mento project with our partner EOG – Mento is a 50/50 JV with EOG as operator and they are moving into the construction phase in 2023 with first gas expected in 2024.
  • We hope to start construction on the solar project and we continue to work on reducing our operating emissions at our facilities and improving our monitoring and measurement of methane emissions.
  • We will continue our partnership with UWI and UTT on the carbon capture and storage atlas. CCS is particularly interesting because it lays the groundwork for the development of hydrogen.
  • Lastly but by no means least, we look forward to completing negotiations following the deepwater bid round and we hope to sign new production sharing agreements with the government to continue our exploration efforts in the deepwater.

 

Further out...

  • Among the prospects we will be looking to progress are Ginger and Coconut. We announced our Ginger discovery in 2019. It’s important to note that these have not yet moved into our project approval process.
  • And we will continue to look at infrastructure led exploration (ILX) or exploration targets that are close to our existing fields.

 

In addition to the amazing work our teams have been doing to deliver significant projects, progress commercial agreements and keep our people safe I am proud and humbled by the work our team is delivering with our community and NGO stakeholders in Mayaro and across Trinidad and Tobago – whether that’s our education and entrepreneurship programmes such as Brighter Prospects and MIPED or bio-diversity projects in Tobago to support climate resilience. These show the positive impact we can have through empowering people and communities, creating opportunities for development and growth.

 

I’m excited about our business but also what our success means to Trinidad and Tobago. With on average half of the country’s energy production coming from bpTT, we understand the significant responsibility we have to continue to lead, to evolve, innovate and fight for the capital we need to continue to invest and grow our business here.  We – bpTT – will continue to play our role in the development of the energy sector.

 

As I shared at the Energy Chamber a few weeks ago - over the past weeks, I’ve met energy sector colleagues, members of the Government and had a chance to talk with bpTT staff and contractors. What struck me was the two common themes that came out of my conversations:

  • A shared cautious optimism about the Trinidad and Tobago energy industry, and 
  • A commitment to collaborate to bring about change that is neededI definitely share these sentiments as I learn more about the T&T energy sector.

 

In fact, they are aligned with bpTT’s approach to development of our acreage.

 

I would like to leave you with two words that best define that approach:

Optimism and commitment

 

We are optimistic about the future; and we are committed to delivering on our investment plans, whether it is bringing on developments like Cassia C or collaborating with others on projects like deepwater and solar.

 

As I end and as we are still celebrating the achievement of 1st gas from Cassia C I would like to share with you a short video on Cassia C that explains how compression works and that showcases the work involved in bringing such a project to fruition.

 

After that I am happy to take any questions you may have.

 

Thank you