By Abiola Olawale
Group Chief Executive Officer (GCEO) of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL), Mele Kyari has revealed that Nigeria is approaching 1.7 million barrels of oil per day production.
This is a significant jump of 0.42 barrels of oil per day from the 1.28 million barrels per day recorded in April.
Kyari made this disclosure while speaking during a stakeholder engagement between the Nigerian Association of Petroleum Explorationists and the NNPCL which was held in Lagos on Saturday.
According to the NNPCL boss, the greatest challenge to oil production in Nigeria is oil theft, pipeline vandalism and other insecurity challenges.
He confirmed the NNPCL has been able to remove over 5,800 illegal connections from Nigeria’s pipelines and took down over 600 illegal refineries over the last two years.
Kyari said efforts like this and others have been driving the country’s production upwardly. He also emphasised the need to put more effort into the fight against insecurity in the oil and gas sector to increase production.
He said: “How do you increase oil production? Remove the security challenge we have in our onshore assets. As we all know, the security challenge is real. It is not just about theft, it is about the availability of the infrastructure to deliver the volume to the market.
“No one is going to put money into oil production when he knows the production will not get to the market. Within the last two years, we removed over 5,800 illegal connections from our pipelines. We took down over 600 illegal refineries – cooking pots or whatever they were. You simply cannot get people to put money until you solve that problem.”
Due to pipeline vandalism, Kyari said everyone resorted to barging, with some spending $21 to transport a barrel of oil to the terminals.
He argued that barging and the trucking of petroleum products did not happen in the 1990s.
He continued: “Barging is not normal. Barging is not economical, even trucking. In 1991, we didn’t think of barging, even to put oil on the trucks. But that’s what we are doing today.
“The good news is, there is substantial work that is being done by the government and I’m not going to speak about it. But I know that this will come to pass. It’s already subsiding. We are already seeing the results.
“As of today’s data, we’re inching to 1.7mbpd. We won’t celebrate this. On 17th of April 2020, our production, without doing anything, without drilling new wells, shot to 2.2mbpd. The difference was COVID-19. The thieves, the vandals, everybody went to sleep.
“We should be able to take control of this infrastructure. We are doing many things. I am very sure things are changing and that is why we are seeing the new value that is coming on the table. Production will improve”.
Speaking, the President of NAPE, Abiodun Ogunjobi, in his address said for Nigeria to record efficient gas production and utilisation there is a need for the upgrade of existing gas infrastructure as well as the addition of new ones.
Also, the Chairman of NAPE’s Board of Trustees, George Osahon, stressed the significance of the NNPCL as the propagator of oil and gas exploration in Nigeria.
Osahon urged Kyari for industry support in areas such as the availability of technical training and data for research purposes.
