Above: Bridgetown (CJ Photo)

By the Caribbean Journal staff

The proposed gas pipeline between Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados are “very much in progress,” according to Barbados Prime Minister Fruendel Stuart.

The two countries have agreed on a 20-year lease with Trinidad, with negotiations on that end “running smoothly,” the Prime Minister said Thursday.

The pipeline plan, which was announced earlier this year, is part of Barbados’ strategy to diversify its energy supply, as Energy Minister Darcy Boyce recently told Caribbean Journal.

The project would bring natural gas from Trinidad to Barbados.

Dr David Estwick, Trinidad’s Minister of Agriculture, Food, Fisheries and Water Resource Management, has already departed for Trinidad to accelerate pipeline talks, he said.

Stuart said that, while he is calling for a “more balanced” trading arrangement between the two countries, relations between Trinidad and Barbados are “sound.”

“The weather is fine — with just a few scattered showers,” he said.