NNPC to grow national reserve to 40 billion barrels by 2025

The Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, said it was working with its partners to grow the national reserve to 40 billion barrels by 2025 and improve crude oil production to three million barrels per day. The corporation also disclosed plans to attract capital through massive investment across its value chain to drive the ambition.

This was made known by the NNPC Group Managing Director, Mele Kyari, at the opening of the 2019 Nigeria Annual International Conference and Exhibition, NAICE, in Lagos yesterday 5th August. He said: “NNPC, with our partners, are driving the national aspiration to grow the national reserve to 40 billion barrels by 2025 and improve crude oil production to three million barrels per day.

“To achieve this ambition, a huge investment is required across the value chain. We have to attract investments to deploy improved technology in the exploration and production of hydrocarbons from inland as well as the ultra-deep offshore basins”.

“We have to open up the midstream, complete all critical gas development projects targeted to deliver about three billion scfd to the gas market, ensure the close-out of investment decision on NLNG Train 7 and improve domestic utilisation to improve power generation and industrial growth.

“Nigeria is still a net importer of petroleum products due to the current state of our refineries, and the long absence of private investment in the refining sector. We require more investments to revamp and expand our domestic refineries and associated infrastructure to support the growth of the downstream sector and guaranty energy security to the nation.”

He noted that the industry had been significantly challenged by several factors, ranging from lack of adequate fiscal policy, regional security, market volatility, sabotage, to theft, among others. He, however, said lack of data gathering continued to pose a serious challenge to the industry, adding that “Today, no data provided by the corporation or any other source is seen to be accurate.”

Explaining the benefits of digitization which, among others, will bring about efficiency and improved production and cost-effectiveness, he said, “We will, therefore, fix our refineries, help Dangote refinery come onstream, and also intervene in facilitating modular refineries, and at the end, we stop product importation.”