BP has agreed to sell a 20 per cent stake in the Venezuelan portion of the cross-border Cocuina-Manakin natural gas field to Trinidad and Tobago's state-owned National Gas Company (NGC), two sources with knowledge of the matter said on Monday.
Trinidad and Tobago Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar is expected to announce the deal later on Monday, the sources said. The agreement comes less than four months after Venezuela granted BP a licence to develop the field.
The Cocuina-Manakin field, which contains one trillion cubic feet of natural gas reserves, straddles the maritime boundary between Trinidad and Tobago and Venezuela, with the Cocuina section forming part of Venezuela's undeveloped Deltana Platform gas project. NGC already holds a 20 per cent stake of the Manakin portion on the Trinidad side.
Venezuela's oil ministry, BP and NGC did not immediately reply to requests for comment. BP and NGC have agreed to market 70 per cent of the project's gas to Atlantic LNG, which operates Latin America's largest liquefied natural gas export facility, according to the sources.
The complex has struggled in recent years due to declining domestic natural gas supplies in Trinidad, which has constrained output and forced the closure of one of its four trains. BP owns a 45 per cent stake in Atlantic LNG, while NGC holds 10 per cent. Shell owns the remaining 45 per cent.
Development at Cocuina-Manakin is progressing towards a final investment decision, which the sources expect by the end of the year. The remaining 30 per cent of produced natural gas at Cocuina-Manakin will be used in petrochemicals.
(Reporting by Curtis Williams in Houston; Additional reporting by Deisy Buitrago in Caracas; Editing by Nathan Crooks and Nia Williams)