NNPC laments low oil production

The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has expressed its readiness to partner with stakeholders in oil and gas to grow the nation's fast depleting reserves.

The Group Managing Director (GMD), NNPC, Dr. Maikanti Baru, made this commitment when the Nigerian Association of Petroleum Explorationists (NAPE) hosted him to a dinner in Abuja at the weekend.

He said the 2016 national average oil production of 1.9 million barrels is low partly due to oil infrastructure vandalism, saying there's need for stakeholders to share data and use common available resources to reduce cost of operations in the area of rig-sharing, vessel sharing and synergy in projects development. He said this has become expedient in this era of low oil prices and security challenges, according to NNPC statement

"Our national gas demand forecast to year 2020 (domestic plus export) indicates a rapid growth to 15bscfd, meaning current reserves level can only sustain that production for 35 years if we do not increase the 2bscfd gas reserves base which require 3tcf to replace production yearly," he said.

The GMD challenged NAPE and other stakeholders to focus on increasing the nation's oil and gas reserve base to match national aspirations, by increasing oil production to four million barrels per day and meet gas demand of 15bscfd by 2020 required for industrialisation and consumption.

Baru said the less than three per cent of all wells drilled in the Niger Delta Basin both onshore and swamp are deeper than 15,000 feet, adding that a greater number of these wells have not gone beyond the 10,000ft as a high pressure regimes seems to be a limiting factor.

On frontier exploration, the NNPC chief said the Corporation is progressing exploration efforts in Chad Basin, Benue trough and the other frontier basins so as to shore up the reserve base of the country.

He said: "Some of our earlier drilled non-commercial holes could be turned around if we deploy requisite technologies. We need to change our perspective of risk as technology is advancing."

Earlier, the NAPE President, Nosa Omorodion said his association is ready to support NNPC in its drive to grow reserves towards increased producibility in all the frontier basins.