Nigeria has unexplored 28 billion barrels of oil reserves located in the offshore area, Chief Operating Officer, Upstream, Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Mr. Bello Rabiu, has said.
According to him, this underscores the need to focus and encourage investment in the country’s upstream sector of the oil and gas industry.
Speaking during a panel session at the just concluded Nigeria Oil and Gas Conference and Exhibition in Abuja, he stressed the importance of unlocking the oil gas potentials of the country to enhance the economy and promote industrialisation.
According to him, to unlock this potential by encouraging investments, there must be clear-cut legal and regulatory frameworks that will allow the investor and the government to understand what to expect, adding that the Federal Government is working to put these in place.
Rabiu said: “The key to unlocking investment potentials are getting clear legal and regulatory frameworks that allow the investor and the government to understand what to expect. This has been a long time goal of the government and I think we are almost there.
“The Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) started in 2000, about 18 years ago, and I think we have started seeing the reality of the bill coming on stream. Hopefully and with the assurance of the National Assembly, the final versions of the PIB will be passed before the end of this year. With that, I believe all the uncertainties around upstream development will be clear and people will be ready and willing to put a lot of investments and unlock the unexplored reserves.
“With a lot of reserves in the offshore area of Nigeria, attention needs to be there. The last estimate we had from a leading industry organisation is that out of 25-28 billion barrels of reserves that we have and yet to be found in the country, about 63 per cent is actually offshore. So, offshore development will be key going forward, therefore, getting clear legal and regulatory framework to actually unleash the potential is key.
“Secondly, since the beginning of this country, the entire 197 trillion standard cubic feet (Tscf) of gas were found in the process of exploring oil. We need to do more about gas because gas is fundamentally becoming more important than oil for two reasons; it is the energy of the future and also more locally inclusive when it comes to the economy of any country. We can unlock the potentials of gas in this country because we have not actually started gas exploration. With about 600 trillion cubic feet of gas estimated by the US Geological Survey, we need to do more again to unlock that potential.“
“Even now with 197 Tscf, we are just about number nine and by the time we have 600 Tscf we will be number two or three globally. But gas had never actually impacted our economy yet. We have done a lot in the last 10 years and I think if we can do a lot about gas, do the LNG Train 7, the pipelines across the country from the gas suppliers to the market, among others, we will see the impact of gas in this country. The only way you can utilise and commercialise gas is ether you liquefy and ship it to the market or put in it in the pipeline and transport to the market. With the current framework and the PIB coming into place, the entire chain in oil and gas will be clear and investors will be willing and ready to release their money.”