The government will reject Techint's gas complaint in Vaca Muerta and the dispute may go to court

The Secretary of Energy, Gustavo Lopetegui, expected that in the coming days, the rejection of Casa Rosada will be formalized to the administrative complaint presented by Tecpetrol for the reduction of subsidies for gas production at Vaca Muerta. In this way, the Techint Group company has the opportunity to go to court to settle the dispute.

In a tour with the journalists who participated domain.com, the official badured that "We will pay for the initial demand curve" at the same time, he ensured that the norm that sparked the controversy "filled his cycle" for what he had termed "closed".

The fight between the government and Tecpetrol, the oil company of Techint group, started end of January when the Energy Secretariat changed the criteria for calculating the economic compensation provided for in Resolution 46/2017, signed by the former Minister of Energy, Juan José Aranguren, for the development of the gas production at Vaca Muerta.

This regulation creates a stimulus for gas producers by ensuring a price similar to that imported by Argentina. The program provided a limit for the compensation of companies producing 8.5 million cubic meters.

Last year, Tecpetrol increased gas production in the Neuquén Basin from 8.5 million cubic meters per day in July to more than 17 million since November. This surplus production is in conflict and the government already predicted that "will not answer" for him.

The office that runs Lopetegui has announced that it will not pay any production compensation to companies that increase their unconventional gas production and that will be responsible only for the projection of production originally presented and not for the increase that could have been obtained. Lopetegui explained that "Some companies have presented a second investment curve and the government has never said that it would pay for this second curve."

In this context, the manager stated that Tecpetrol "thought that he had to charge the total volume of production and we for the volume of production presented when the companies had taken part in the program." They signed a document that says that I am determined to invest X and I will produce Y. We will pay 8.5 million cubic meters a day. "

The own Energy Holder said that "we do not doubt he is helping us understand the reason" and he was confident of facing the immediate future: "We have not changed anything that was signed originally".

For the moment, Lopetegui has anticipated that the arguments in favor of rejecting the administrative appeal presented by Tecpetrol will be known "within ten days" and claimed that, later, "the company will see if the case goes to court ".

It should be recalled that a few days ago, Tecpetrol informed the Exchange that it would stop receiving $ 5.6 billion for the production it had injected last year and planned to initiate administrative actions without however, forego bringing the case to justice.