Wales, a village on the West Bank of Demerara, could become the model for Guyana’s next phase of industrial development as the country shifts to natural gas to support new industries, cheaper power, and broader economic transformation.
Senior Petroleum Coordinator at the Ministry of Natural Resources, Dr. Bobby Gossai Jr., said Guyana is now looking beyond crude oil production and focusing on how natural gas can drive industrial growth.
Gossai said the government’s first gas-to-energy project is being developed with electricity generation as the initial priority. That power, he said, is intended to supply the national grid and reach both households and commercial users.
“What we want to do is to ensure with cheaper power, stable power and reliable power that more industries can be developed,” Gossai said.
The Wales development is expected to play a central role in that transition. Gossai said Guyana is moving into the second phase at Wales, which could establish an industrial development blueprint that can later be used in other parts of the country.
He said a second pipeline to Berbice could potentially be larger than the Wales pipeline and provide enough resources to support new areas of industrial activity.
According to Gossai, those developments could take Guyana into “industrial” and “eco-industrial” development, creating industries that do not currently exist in the country because of the gas and power that would become available.
The government is already examining downstream opportunities, including gas bottling plants, ammonia-urea production and other petrochemical industries.
Gossai said the goal is to identify industries Guyana can develop competitively, not only for the domestic and regional markets, but also for wider international markets.
Gossai said Guyana’s oil and gas sector is not being treated as an end in itself, but as a catalyst for growth across other sectors of the economy.
