Spanish Lookout receives first oil royalty cheque

Oil is in the news tonight—for a number of reasons. Firstly, Belize Natural Energy has confirmed what the Geology and Petroleum Department has already announced. That is, the new well called Never Delay Number One has produced oil and gas shows which warranted testing. The drilling of that test well was completed November sixth and further testing and evaluation is being conducted before the find’s commercial value can be determined. The other bit of news is that residents of Spanish Lookout have finally received their first royalty cheque. The payment of over four hundred and thirty-three thousand dollars was received earlier this week and represents five percent of government’s seven point five percent royalty on the value of the oil pumped by B.N.E. from the area. Land owners in Duck Run are due around forty thousand dollars which they will receive once their land documents have been sorted out. The royalty payments cover oil pumped from January 2006 through June 2007. Government’s royalty during that time totalled around nine point five million Belize dollars and the latest figure as stated in the publicly accessible Petroleum Register show government’s royalty through September standing at twelve point three-three million dollars. It must be pointed out that the bulk of government’s oil revenues come from the forty percent income tax on B.N.E.’s profits. That closely scrutinised number has not yet been released to the public.