Abstract
The audit of the natural gas reserves of Trinidad and Tobago neither provides complete knowledge of all the country's natural gas resources, nor does it provide a future industry production outlook. It does not take into consideration resources that are unknown, undeclared, or outside the scope of its audit ("Unaudited Resources"). These deficiencies are addressed through the Trinidad and Tobago Natural Gas Industry Long Range Forecasting Model.
The Model starts with that subset of the gas resources that has been audited as at 31st December 2014. The unaudited resources are then added together with scenarios of annual rates of natural gas production, resource discovery rates, and different policy measures. The "model' then generates projected demand and production scenarios for the natural gas industry.
Trinidad and Tobago is a vast, significantly under-explored and under-exploited hydrocarbon prone marine territory of over 70,000 square kilometers inclusive of 5,130 square kilometers of land. It has been a leader in the global hydrocarbon industry for over 400 years, which is 300 years more than the often quoted 100 years of commercial oil exploitation. It's current audited 3P reserves as at end of 2014 are ca. 23 TCF and the exploration resources are ca. 44 TCF. This paper asserts that at least a further 33 TCF of Unaudited Resources exist outside the scope of the audit a total of ca. 100 TCF. Based on this more comprehensive estimate, the Model predicts that the natural gas industry of Trinidad and Tobago has at least a further 100 years of life much longer than the R/P ratio of 8 or R/2P of 12.
This paper presents changes to the size of a country, its history and its predicted future by synthesizing knowledge available from different sources. It concludes that there is a much longer future for the natural gas industry in addition to the belief that there is enough time to create new sustainable economic activities to replace the economic contribution of the natural gas industry.
