Shell, Venezuela, and the Return of the “Permissioned” Petroleum Rush

Shell is reportedly eyeing a renewed push into Venezuelan gas projects that could be worth billions, after a dramatic shift in Washington’s stance toward Caracas and the country’s leadership. 

This is not a simple “back to business” story. It’s a reminder that in the hydrocarbons world, geology is optional; licensing is everything—and geopolitics is the real project operator.

The prize: Dragon gas and the Trinidad outlet

The centre of gravity for Shell’s Venezuela positioning remains the Dragon offshore gas field, long discussed as a potential supply source for Trinidad and Tobago’s LNG and petrochemical complex. The U.S. has previously issued authorisations to allow Shell and Trinidad to progress Dragon under sanctions carve-outs, with terms and limits designed to avoid material benefit to Venezuela’s sanctioned state apparatus. 

That matters because Trinidad has a practical problem: gas shortages. Dragon is the nearest sizeable “foreign” feedstock option, and the project has been treated as strategically important for Trinidad’s energy system. 

The new twist: Washington’s leverage-first approach

Reuters reporting this week paints a blunt U.S. message to oil majors: if companies want to recover old expropriation-related debts and awards, they may be expected to reinvest upfront into Venezuela’s degraded oil system first. 

In other words, it’s not just “come back”—it’s “come back and bring capex, and then we’ll talk about getting paid.”

That framing turns energy projects into a kind of geopolitical instalment plan: investment now, recovery later, subject to shifting political weather.

Why Shell is differently positioned

Unlike some U.S. majors still primarily focused on compensation battles, Shell’s Venezuela adjacency is more about gas-to-Trinidad economics and the ability to monetise molecules through an existing regional export platform—if the permissions and politics align. 

But “align” is doing heroic work in that sentence. Sanctions terms, partner eligibility, payment constraints, and the definition of “benefit” to Venezuelan entities can change the practical viability of a project overnight. 

The uncomfortable question: who writes the risk register?

Here’s where the story stops being purely commercial.

The same week investors are being invited to imagine a Venezuelan “reopening,” the wider reporting emphasises just how volatile and expensive any revival would be—and how political the whole effort is. 

So the real decision isn’t whether Venezuela has gas (it does). The decision is whether a supermajor can justify the reputational and political exposure of operating in a theatre where:

• the rules can be rewritten by executive action,

• licences can be time-boxed or conditioned,

• and the “success case” depends on diplomacy as much as engineering. 

ShellBot’s internal memo (a brief satire)

ShellBot (Strategy Mode): “We are not returning to Venezuela. We are approaching optionality in a sanctions-compliant manner.”

RiskBot: “Optionality has a habit of becoming reality the moment the first pipe is laid.”

CommsBot: “No comment.”

ArchiveBot: “The internet heard ‘no comment’ and filled in the rest.”

Human Controller: “Can we just say ‘we comply with all applicable sanctions’ and go back to our slide deck?”

Satire aside, there’s a serious governance point here: the vacuum between corporate silence and public speculation is now routinely filled by automated narratives—some accurate, some not, all sticky.

Bottom line

Shell’s Venezuela angle looks less like a sudden adventure and more like a re-activation of an existing regional gas logic—Dragon feeding Trinidad—made newly tempting (and newly risky) by U.S. political momentum and the prospect of a broader Venezuelan energy reset. 

Whether this becomes “billions” or another chapter in the long library of “nearly-developed” projects will depend on the one commodity that never appears on reserves statements:

permission.

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Standard disclaimer + legal-strength satire caption

Disclaimer: This article is commentary for informational purposes only. It does not constitute financial, investment, legal, or sanctions-compliance advice. Where third-party reporting is cited, it is cited as reported by those outlets at the time. Readers should verify facts independently and seek professional advice before acting on any information.

Satire caption (legal-strength): Certain passages (including “ShellBot” dialogue) are obvious satire and parody, used to critique systems, narratives, and corporate risk culture. Any resemblance to real bots, real memos, or real executive group chats is either coincidental—or evidence that the simulation is underfunded.

This website and sisters royaldutchshellgroup.com, shellnazihistory.com, royaldutchshell.website, johndonovan.website, shellnews.net, and shellwikipedia.com, are owned by John Donovan. There is also a Wikipedia segment.