The United States (US) Export-Import (EXIM) Bank has granted pre-approval for its loan for the Gas-to-Energy (GtE) Project. This was disclosed by Vice President Bharrat Jagdeo during his weekly press conference on Thursday.
He disclosed that the loan was approved by the Bank’s Board of Directors at their November 21, 2024, meeting, and sent to Congress for 30 days “after which it will be returned to the board for final approval”
The Guyana Government in April 2023 announced that it applied to the US EXIM Bank for a US$761 million loan for the GtE project. Jagdeo on Thursday disclosed that the full sum will not be approved but the approved sum will be more than US$500M.
According to reports, the Government has already expended some US$400 million on the Project.
Jagdeo said, “The loan will also provide retroactive financing so if the loan is made available, it will cover financing that the Government of Guyana had to make since the project started.”
The GtE project includes the construction of an Integrated Natural Gas Liquid (NGL) Plant and a 300-megawatt (MW) combined cycle power plant at Wales, West Bank Demerara (WBD), utilising natural gas from the country’s offshore operations in the Stabroek Block.
As part of its internal due diligence process, the US EXIM Bank hired two consultants – Ramba Consulting Group, a professional governmental consulting firm which did an environment assessment of the GtE Project, and Sargent & Lundy, one of the world’s longest-standing full-service architect engineering firms, which did the technical assessment. These works were done during site visits over the past year after which it was positive feedback was provided.
The Government is expecting the power plant to come on stream in the first half of next year.
