Repsol's Trinidad and Tobago Business Unit director Luis Polo said yesterday the sale of the company's stake in Point Fortin-based LNG producer Atlantic will not affect other operations in Trinidad and Tobago.

Polo told the Express yesterday after the opening ceremony for the Caricom Energy Ministers meeting at the Hyatt Regency (Trinidad), Port of Spain that "the situation of Repsol in Trinidad will remain as it is".

On Wednesday in Parliament Energy Minster Kevin Ramnarine announced the Spanish company's interest in Atlantic's four LNG trains would be sold to Royal Dutch Shell for US$6.2 billion in a deal which also included Repsol's Peruvian assets.

Shell previously operated in Trinidad until the late 1970s, when its assets were sold to the Government to form Trintoc, the precursor to Petrotrin.

Repsol's former Atlantic interests include a 20 per cent stake in Train one; 25 per cent in Trains two and three; and 22.2 per cent in Train four.

Polo said the company made a commitment to working in Trinidad and the working environment was "good".

"We hold 70 per cent of the operatorship in TSP which we will continue. We have plans to expand the activity there and we also have a fair stake—30 per cent – in bpTT, and that is important," he said.

Also attending the opening ceremony was BHP Billiton T&T president Vincent Pereira, who told the Express that work on the recently awarded deepwater blocks was "progressing". "We are talking with the Ministry of Energy. We have technical work going on to understand how schedules will run at this point, but I can't say much than that," he said.

Pereira said the company was "thrilled to win" the deepwater bid round in a clean sweep last year.

"It was a very competitive process and we are happy with what we got," he said.