By Edith Ike-Eboh and Emmanuel Afonne
The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC Ltd.) started the new week with an assurance to its investors and stakeholders that the days of complacency were over.
The assurance came following the repositioning of the company to focus on profitability and value addition to its shareholders.
The GMD/CEO of the NNPC, Malam Mele Kyari, gave the assurance at the opening ceremony of the 2022 edition of the Nigerian Oil and Gas (NOG) Conference and Exhibition which held at the International Conference Centre, Abuja.
Declaring the conference open, Kyari who was represented by NNPC Chief Financial Officer, Mr Umar Ajiya, called on operators in the nations oil and gas industry to focus more on gas development.
Kyari said emphasis should be on gas-to-power, gas-to-industry and gas-for-export projects and activities.
He explained that with the reality of the global energy transition and Nigerias commitment to use gas as its transition fuel, value now lies in gas development.
The NNPC GMD/CEO also said that the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) had also provided ample incentives for investors in the gas sector.
Kyari urged delegates and exhibitors to use the opportunity provided by the conference to network and brainstorm on solutions to the challenges brought about by the global energy transition and the Russian-Ukraine war.
He also urged them to find better ways to maximise the potentials inherent in the nations abundant gas resources.
Meanwhile, the NNPC Ltd. within the week called on its partners and operators in the oil and gas industry to beef up investment in order to close the yawning energy supply gap in the country.
The GMD/CEO of NNPC Ltd., Malam Mele Kyari, made the call at the NNPC Spotlight Session of the just concluded 21st Nigerian Oil and Gas Conference and Exhibition which held at the International Conference Centre, Abuja.
Speaking at the conference with theme, Funding the Nigerian Energy Mix for Sustainable Economic Growth, Kyari said there was a huge gap in the Nigerian energy market with 80 per cent of citizens lacking access to clean cooking gas and 48 per cent lacking access to electricity.
That gap is huge and we cannot fill it with the scale of investment we are doing in the renewable.
This is critical for us and we will continue to emphasise that our key role is to be able to bring gas and make it available to everyone.
The fact that energy transition is unfolding to everyone means we must invest in it and we are seeing a great resistance across the globe on funding fossil fuel until the Ukrainian challenge came up.
According to Kyari, NNPC is currently engaging with partners and multilateral institutions that are involved in energy transition to find ways of resetting financing strategies in a manner that will enable energy companies and institutions to collaborate for investment in order to eradicate energy poverty.
On the new role of NNPC as a limited liability company, Kyari said that NNPC had been positioned as the company with the largest capital base in Africa to serve as a reliable partner to all willing investors.
In this regard, NNPC Ltd. offers a lineup of investment opportunities that guarantee positive returns across the energy value chain.
On July 19, 2022, Mr President will unveil the new NNPC Ltd. to the world. I am inviting you to that epoch-making event in the history of our company, he said.
Also speaking at the conference, Chairman of Board of Directors, NNPC Ltd., Sen. Margery Chuba-Okadigbo said that the mandate of the new NNPC was clearly spelt out in the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) 2021.
According to her, the PIA is a testament to the Federal Governments commitment to put in place the right environment for the advancement and development of oil and gas industry.
NNPC limited is a commercially oriented and profit driven company which creates opportunities for improved indigenous participation.
The new entity presents opportunities for enhanced revenue and returns on investment.
She stated that the effective implementation of the PIA would stimulate sustainable social impact through the creation of quality jobs for the teeming youth and consequently change the social perception of the industry.
In the meantime, the Group General Manager of the National Petroleum Investment Management Services (NAPIMS), Mr Bala Wunti, disclosed that Nigeria needed about 800 billion dollar-worth of investments to meet the crude oil production target of four million barrels per day.
Wunti made the disclosure in Abuja during a panel session at the just concluded 21st Nigerian Oil and Gas Conference and Exhibition with the theme, Funding the Nigerian Energy Mix for Sustainable Economic Growth.
He said the money must be channeled into exploration and production, midstream conversion capability and requisite downstream infrastructure.
Speaking on the theme, Energy Transition: Making Nigeria the Preferred Africa Energy Investment Hub, the NAPIMS boss said Nigeria had abundant crude oil and natural gas resources which can only translate to value for the country if properly harnessed and produced for the benefit of the people.
He said that the time had come for the country to look inwards and develop its huge oil and gas potentials by restructuring the industry to attract the much-needed investments across the oil and gas value chain that would create wealth and prosperity for the people.
He called for stronger partnership and collaboration among stakeholders in the oil and gas sector, particularly in the area of finance, project execution, and technology development.
Giving a breakdown of the investments required, Wunti said that the country needed about 400 billion dollars in the upstream and midstream segments of the value chain, while another 250 billion dollars investment would be required in the downstream sector across the country in order to ensure energy sufficiency.
International oil companies (IOCs) operating in Nigeria including Shell, Chevron, TotalEnergies, and ExxonMobil in the week under review expressed their frustration over the escalating oil losses in the Niger Delta due to the activities of oil thieves.
Speaking at the industry leaders panel session at the 2022 edition of the Nigerian Oil and Gas Conference and Exhibition, the CEOs said the unrelenting menace of crude oil theft had led to a decline of the nations daily oil production from 1.8million barrels per day in the last three years to just a little over one million barrel per day.
Firing the first salvo on the topic: The Future of Nigerias Energy Sector in the PIA Era, the Chairman of Shell Companies in Nigeria and Managing Director of Shell Petroleum Development Company, Mr Osagie Okunbor, warned that the new marginal field licensees that would operate Oil Mining Leases (OMLs) 53 and 57 may experience difficulties evacuating their crude oil.
Okunbor said that two of the most important oil pipelines in the country were currently shut down with hundreds of thousands of barrels a day shut-in.
In three to five years, we were brought down from 1.8 million barrels. So it is an existential issue for us.
We need to address it; if we do not address it, we cannot do all the new oil development issues, and that will continue to occur.
But what is really going to move the needle for us in terms of bridging this gap of hundreds of thousands of barrels a day is solving the evacuation problem.
He tasked stakeholders and participants at the conference to put heads together to seek ways to deal with the challenge.
Managing Director of Chevron Nigeria Limited and Chairman of the Oil Producers Trade Section (OPTS), Mr Rick Kennedy, said while the industry stakeholders collaborate to fine-tune the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) in a manner that offers encouragement to all players, it was also imperative for the oil theft challenge to be addressed by all parties.
On his part, the Executive Director at ExxonMobil Nigeria, Mr Oladotun Isiaka, who represented the Managing Director, Mr Richard Laing, also said stakeholders should work together to tackle the oil theft challenge as it was impacting negatively on investments in the upstream sector.
The Managing Director of TotalEnergies E