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GEORGE TOWN (Guyana), May 20 (AP) — U.S. oil major Exxon Mobil Corp said Friday it has appealed a recent Guyana court ruling that forced it to make a major leak off the coast of Guyana. Hundreds of millions of dollars were allocated for oil incidents.
The company said in a statement that the court failed to take into account that Exxon and its consortium partners Hess Corp. and China Overseas Offshore Engineering Corporation had an “undoubted ability” to meet their financial obligations when the spill occurred at their operations.
The consortium is operating the prolific Stabroek block near the southeastern border with Suriname.
In a ruling two weeks ago, the Guyana High Court ordered the local environmental agency to obtain independent liability insurance from ExxonMobil subsidiary Esso Exploration and Production Ltd. It also sought an unlimited guarantee from its parent company in case of damage from operations in the South American country.
Activists and environmentalists fear the spill could severely impact the country’s marine resources while undermining the tourism economy of nearby Caribbean nations.
The consortium’s lead operator, ExxonMobil, argued that the likelihood of a leak was remote and that the court had “failed to recognize the Stabroek block joint venture’s ability to meet our financial obligations, supplemented by our insurance that was in place and our Financial assurance agreement with EPA that exceeds industry benchmarks.”
Production started in December 2019 and is expected to soar to 1.2 million bpd by 2027 at about 380,000 bpd.
The Guyana government this week said it supported the appeal, arguing that the judge erred in his decision, in part because the environmental agency had already agreed with Exxon on how much each field was assessed in the spill. (Associated Press)
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from a Syndicated News feed, the content body may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)
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