bp and Venezuela have confirmed that they are in discussions with the Trinidad and Tobago government to develop a shared offshore gas field in the Caribbean, according to Reuters.

In a statement released on Thursday, bp confirmed that they are in discussions with the government of Trinidad and Tobago and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela regarding the potential development of gas resources in the Manakin-Cocuina field. bp operates the Manakin field, which lies in Trinidad’s waters.

This statement was further supported by Venezuela’s state-run oil company PDVSA, which announced on social media that they are considering issuing a license for exploring and developing non-associated gas on their side of the shared field.

Over the past five years, bp’s gas production in Trinidad has dropped from more than 2.2bcf/d to approximately 1.2bcf/d.

bp has been seeking to increase its natural gas production in Trinidad to feed into the local Atlantic LNG’s liquefied natural gas export facility.

The Manakin-Cocuina field straddles both sides of the countries’ borders and bp has stated that the development discussions are in line with the recent easing of US sanctions against Venezuela.

It is worth noting that the Manakin-Cocuina field was unitized in 2015, but talks on its development were stalled upon the imposition of US sanctions in 2019 against Venezuela.