Government commits to gas export, utilisation

The National Petroleum Investment Management Service (NAPIMS) has stated that the Federal Government is increasing efforts towards the completion of the Nigeria-Morocco Trans-Sahara pipelines to drive gas export and utilisation.

The Group General Manager, NAPIMS, Mr. Bala Wunti, at the pre-conference workshop of the 40th yearly international conference of the Nigerian Association of Petroleum Explorationists (NAPE), scheduled to hold on November 13-17th 2022, said the Federal Government is also supporting the wholeheartedly, the National Gas Expansion Programme (NGEP) in its bid to expand and deepen gas commercialisation and utilisation.

Wunti who was represented by the General Manager, of Nigerian Petroleum Exchange (NIPEX), Andrew Brant, said: “Gas has been adopted as a transition fuel and as such we are trying to grow our gas resources and the reserves. The reserves can improve when we seriously put in efforts towards gas exploration to attain about 600 trillion cubic feet of gas.

Within NNPC, we have renewed our PSCs and also we are empowering NNPC via the PIA to take full responsibility for the commercial operations and the joint ventures. All these will help towards growing our gas reserves.

“Locally, in Nigeria, we have the Kaduna-Abuja gas pipeline which is steadily progressing and it would help to increase our local gas utilisation in the country,” he added.

On renewable energy, he said the country has a Renewable Commission partnering with the industry, and research institutions to drive the utilisation of renewable energy in Nigeria.

“So with these steps, NNPC hopes to contribute to the energy transition plan and to the COP 2026 goals and aspirations that have been set for the country,” he said.

He pointed out that one of the causes of the recent flooding in the country is climate change, maintaining that NNPC is also trying as much as possible to decarbonise its operations while pursuing carbon capture initiatives all over the industry.

Also speaking, the Executive Commissioner, Exploration and Acreage Management, Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), Ms. Rose Udong, said the nation is currently on track to increase its gas resources, saying that the Commission is strengthening engagements with International Oil Companies (IOCs) to interact and understand their challenges.

Earlier, the president NAPE, Dr. James Edet, while speaking on the theme of the pre-conference “Energy security and transition strategies: Opportunities and challenges in Nigeria”, underscored the importance and contribution of its members to partner with other related disciplines to solve the challenges in the oil and gas sector of the economy.