The story of Guyana today feels like a parable. A small country, rich in rivers and rainforests, and an abundance of wildlife, suddenly finds itself sitting on vast reserves of petroleum. A consortium including ExxonMobil, Hess, and CNOOC is extracting it from the seabed in quantities almost biblical in scale. The gross recoverable resource from the Stabroek Block alone is estimated at nearly 11 billion oil-equivalent barrels, complemented by an estimated 17 trillion cubic feet of natural gas [1, 2]. The government counts the royalties, businesses count the contracts, and young engineers count the years until they can afford their first new home. It feels, in this moment, as if Guyana’s future has never been brighter for a growing number of people.
But history, especially the history of oil, is not always so generous. It carries lessons written in shale and sand, from Texas to the Middle East, and more recently from a cold and windy place called Williston, North Dakota.
Boomtown, USA
A generation ago, Williston was a quiet prairie town at the edge of the Bakken shale formation. Then hydraulic fracturing—fracking—unlocked billions of barrels. Almost overnight, Williston became “Boomtown, USA.” Its population nearly doubled between 2010 and 2020 as new drilling technologies transformed the region [3]. Oil and gas jobs became a dominant feature of the local economy. Salaries skyrocketed, chain stores arrived, and rents surged to levels comparable to those in major metropolitan areas.
For a while, it looked like the American Dream in overdrive: the lowest unemployment rate in the nation, money pouring in, new buildings rising as if from nowhere. Yet beneath the shine, pressure built. There weren’t enough houses. Workers crowded into temporary housing known as “man camps” or paid exorbitant rents. Eviction rates soared as the housing market struggled to cope with the influx of newcomers [4].
And then, as quickly as the boom began, oil prices fell. The workers who had come in search of high-paying jobs packed their pickups and left. Williston, once bursting at the seams, was suddenly running on empty. Storefronts went dark. The “boomtown” billboard began to look like satire.
Guyana’s Parallel
Guyana is no prairie town, but the parallels are striking. Offshore discoveries have already made it the world’s fastest-growing oil economy. Billions of dollars are being invested in pipelines, processing plants, deep-water ports, and natural gas infrastructure. Each project is a magnet, attracting workers from Brazil, Suriname, the Caribbean, and beyond.
Already, housing in Georgetown and coastal regions is in short supply. Informal settlements spread along drainage canals. Rents creep upward. Government programs struggle to keep pace. The oil money has just begun to flow, yet signs of shortage are visible.
Now imagine the next decade: tens of thousands of foreign workers arriving to lay pipe, weld steel, assemble rigs, or operate future power plants. Skilled labor will be in short supply because Guyana cannot yet produce enough engineers, electricians, and mechanics to fill the gap. With them will come demand for apartments, dormitories, single-family homes, shops, schools, and hospitals.
If the boom doubles the population of parts of coastal Guyana, as it doubled Williston’s, what happens to a country already battling floods, fragile infrastructure, and a limited housing stock? Does Georgetown become the next “eviction capital,” where the poor are pushed aside for oil workers with per diems?
The Temptation of the Moment
When the money pours in, leaders are tempted to think it will continue to pour in forever. They see only the skyscrapers and the contracts, not the ghost towns left behind when oil tumbles from $100 to $40 a barrel. Oil history is a history of booms and busts. Loren Dvirnak, a farmer in Killdeer, North Dakota, once told a reporter: “I’ve been around oil long enough to know that even if you have a well, it could be plugged in a month. Those royalties could end.” He named wells after his grandchildren, but he never counted on them to pay for their futures. That is wisdom Guyana would do well to heed.
Housing as the Pressure Valve
The housing question is not a side issue. It is the pressure valve of the boom. If workers arrive faster than houses can be built, prices soar, tempers flare, and inequality hardens. The poor are displaced, the middle class squeezed, and only the oil companies can afford the rents. This is what happened in Williston: families were evicted so that itinerant workers could pay triple the rent.
Guyana has an advantage: it can see this coming. It has not yet been overwhelmed. It can plan now.
One answer lies in modular housing, with factories producing homes like aircraft parts—quickly, efficiently, and at scale. Another lies in partnerships, such as with the U.S. EXIM Bank to finance such factories, and with the Greater Guyana Initiative. This US$100 million (GYD20 billion) investment by the Stabroek Block co-venturers—ExxonMobil Guyana, Hess Guyana Exploration, and CNOOC Petroleum Guyana Limited—is designed to support capacity-building projects aligned with the country’s development [5]. The oil majors cannot build every house, but they can help ensure Guyana has the skills and resilience to do it.
The Caution
If Guyana manages the boom wisely, it could avoid Williston’s fate. However, if it does not, by letting workers pour in without housing, and if it spends freely in good times without considering the lean years that will come, it may find itself in the same position North Dakota did: with shuttered storefronts, abandoned apartments, and the word “Boomtown” receding into irony.
Guyana is at a hinge of history. It can either repeat the cautionary tale of Williston or write a new story—one in which the oil wealth is harnessed to build not just rigs and refineries, but lasting communities.
That choice will not be made in Houston or Beijing. It will be made in Georgetown.
References
[1] ExxonMobil. (n.d.). Guyana project overview. Retrieved from https://corporate.exxonmobil.com/locations/guyana/operations/guyana-project-overview
[2] U.S. International Trade Administration. (2024, February 15). Guyana – Energy. Retrieved from https://www.trade.gov/country-commercial-guides/guyana-energy
[3] Wikipedia. (n.d.). Williston, North Dakota. Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williston,_North_Dakota
[4] Grist. (2024, January 19). How an oil boom in North Dakota led to a boom in evictions. Retrieved from https://grist.org/housing/how-an-oil-boom-in-north-dakota-led-to-a-boom-in-evictions/
[5] Greater Guyana Initiative. (n.d.). About Us. Retrieved from https://greaterguyanainitiative.gy/about-us/
Kwasi Fraser
Board Member and Senior Advisor, Guyana Infrastructure Consortium
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🌐 www.GuyanaConsortium.com
About the Author: Kwasi Fraser is President of the Guyana Infrastructure Consortium and former four-term Mayor of Purcellville, Virginia. He holds an MBA from Rutgers University and a BS in Engineering from SUNY Stony Brook, with over 20 years of experience in strategic business development and public sector leadership.
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