Jamaica’s bid to become oil producer moves into encouraging phase

According to Caribbean Life News, Jamaica’s long-held ambitions to become an oil and gas producer has entered into a new and exciting phase with the British license holder announcing the start of a study to determine the availability of drilling rigs and associated daily costs, officials said this week. United Oil and Gas of The United Kingdom says it is anxious for information about drilling rigs as it steps up its search for a senior operator to move the project to an actual search for commercial quantities of oil and gas. Two potential sites have already been established via seismic work in recent years: Colibri lies in about 750 meters of water, while Thunderball is at 1,900 meters. The two have a potential total of about one billion barrels of oil in the Walton-Morant Bay area off the island’s south coast. “This drilling study marks an important step in our operational planning to advance the Walton-Morant license t