The Nation Newspaper

Category: Business

  • Firm introduces gas machines to save cost

    NO proffer solution to the cost of power consumption in the country, Mantrac Nigeria Limited has introduced generators that are powered by gas.

    The generators popularly known as Caterpillar, the company said, would help to reduce the cost of operations and maximise business potential.

    The product is expected to move the oil and gas industry forward by reducing the cost of operation for the end-user

    The firm is the caterpillar dealer for Nigeria whose objective is to provide the highest quality products and services to satisfy the expectations and requirements of valued customers

    The Managing Director of the company, Edmund Martin-Lawson, who spoke during the gas to power seminar in Lagos, said the company was committed to providing electric power solutions to operate businesses at maximum efficiency.

    The company, he said, offers Olympian generators from 10KVA to 220KVA and caterpillar generators from 250KVA to 7000KVA, providing both primary and standby power.

    He said the generators could be used to power offshore oil rigs, mines in remote areas, communities in areas far from utility power grids, hospitals, schools, factories, airports and office buildings.

    According to him, the engines were designed to power trucks, ships and boats, agricultural equipment, construction and mining machines, adding that the company provides turnkey service covering all operational stages, from system design, testing and installation to commissioning, training and long-term maintenance and repair.

    In addition, the company offers Scheduling Oil Sampling (SOS) for all major oil-lubricated systems including engines, transmissions, hydraulic systems and final drives.

    He expressed concern that the government has not done enough to ensure the use of gas in the country, which he said is cheaper than diesel in the long term use.

    “If you buy a generator set that uses diesel to generate power, it is costlier than using gas to produce the same quantity of power and if you use gas you are reducing part of the cost of production of that factory which in the long term should be able to reduce the cost of their products,” he said.

    On the effect of the new product on the operating environment, he stated that emissions from gas powered generator sets are less when compared with diesel powered sets. He, however, noted that every country has its peculiar business risks.

  • Eko Electricity spends N1.6b on network reinforcement

    •Launches energy saving bulbs

    The management of Eko Electricity Distribution Company has spent N1.6 billion to reinforce distribution and transmission facilities within its network.

    The Chief Executive Officer of the company, Mr Oladele Amoda, an engineer, stated this during the company’s quarterly briefing and launch of energy saving bulbs in Lagos. He said the company was celebrating momentum milestone in power delivery, having got numerous commendations from customers.

    He told the customers that the improved power delivery is part of the reason the government had consistently justified the need for a cost-reflective tariff, which will engender an investor-friendly climate.

    Some of the major projects the company earmarked for completion before end of this year include the reinforcement of critical 33KV, 11KV feeders and rehabilitation of distribution substations for effective evacuation and distribution of power to customers within the company’s network.

    Others include the installation of four numbers of 15MVA, 33/11KV power transformers, which would be used to replace and reinforce existing injection substations at Sanya in Orile Business Unit; Keffi in Ikoyi, Islands Business Unit; Ademola in Victoria Islands and LUTH in Mushin Business Unit; installation of 35 numbers of 500KVA, and 33KVA distribution transformers at Lekki Phase 1, Agungi, Ojo, Orile, Surulere, Ibeju, Mushin, Festac, Apapa, Yaba, among others, for relief of overloaded ones and replacement of failed ones.

    The company will also replace some obsolete 33KV and 11KV switchgear in various locations and rehabilitation of the dilapidated and flood prone LUTH 2x15MVA injection substation for effective evacuation of power to Lagos State University Teaching Hospital and immediate community.

    The Niger Delta Power Holding Company which manages the National Integrated Power Project (NIPP) is also building 27 different projects within the company’s network.

    As part of efforts to encourage the customers to imbibe the culture of energy conservation, the management of Eko also launched energy saving bulbs (light emitting diodes) LED.

    Amoda said the company bought 1500 of such bulbs, which would be distributed free of charge to customers to create awareness on the importance using such bulbs. He said the bulb doesn’t generate heat, uses less energy to give more illumination and also lasts at least 25 years.

    He said: “Energy saving bulbs has been around for a couple of years. But they only got popular in 2007 after the Austrian government decided to ban standard bulbs and replace them with energy saving bulbs. The bulb reduces carbon dioxide emissions, and it is environmentally friendly.

    “Energy saving bulbs are said to be five times more efficient than standard bulbs. The LED lighting lasts upward of 60,000 hours before needing replacement. LED light bulbs use about half the wattage of fluorescent lighting, about 6 watts of power as against 14 watts of power for a Compact Fluorescent Light (CFL) light bulb.

    “For a LED bulb’s lifespan, about 340 kilowatt hours of electricity is used. CFL bulbs used over 60,000 hours (6 bulbs) will use around 840 kilowatt hours of electricity. As far as energy efficiency goes, LED light bulbs are about five times more efficient than fluorescent lighting.”

    Amoda said the launch is important because residential customers constitute reasonable number of the customer base. “The residential customers constitute a significant percentage of our customer’s population. Embracing energy efficiency and conservation can therefore make significant impact on system stability and reliability. Energy saving derived from efficient usage and conservation can be diverted to commercial and industrial use.

    “The rising cost of fuel and electricity makes the need to conserve energy every more evident and the growing need to adopt environmental friendly technology and renewable energy.”

  • Bureau gets nod to certify vessels

    The former Chairman, Marine Engineering and Naval Architecture Division of the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE), Akin Olaniyan, has said the International Naval Surveys Bureau (INSB) has been authorised by the Maritime Administration of Moldova – Public Institution Harbour Master Giurgiulesti – to certify vessels flying the Moldavian flag.

    This, according to him, is to expand the authorisation of INSB and provide it with the ability to serve ship owners, managers or operators whose fleet is registered or intended to be registered under the Moldavian flag.

  • NPA seeks compliance with security checks

    The Nigeria Port Authority (NPA) has urged stakeholders to comply with the security measures at the entry gates of the ports in Lagos.

    Speaking at a stakeholders’ meeting at the Apapa Command of the Nigeria Customs Service in Lagos, NPA’sAssistant General Manager, Security, Mr Samuel Asamagie, who represented the Port Manager, Mr Joshua Ashanga, urged port users to comply with the checks at the ports.

    He said some of challenges at the ports resulted from the human traffic so, emphasis would placed on checking port users at the gate before they enter the port.

    He said security at the gate would be fortified, adding that such measure could lead to 80 per cent reduction of the challenges faced at the ports.

    He stressed that there would be checks at the gate of Tin Can Island Port and the Lagos Port Complex and called on stakeholders to submit themselves to the checks.

    ‘’If we all expose ourselves to checks at the access gates , I can assure us that it will eliminate a lot of problems at the ports in Lagos. It may create a lot of inconvenience, but I want to say that it is better to suffer a little inconvenience than suffer the consequences that will follow,” Ashanga said.

    According to him, the NPA has put in place measures to address stowaways and attacks on vessels, which, he said, pose security challenges at the ports.

     

  • Lagos advises LAWMA sweepers on service delivery, safety

    Lagos advises LAWMA sweepers on service delivery, safety

    •We want insurance cover, medicare

    Lagos State Governor, Babatunde Fashola has urged the Lagos Waste Management Authority (LAWMA) on the need to evolve solutions that will enhance service delivery in the face of high vehicular traffic and population growth.

    He spoke at the fourth sensitisation and awareness programme for stakeholders. He asked them to take advantage of the annual training/workshop to interact with stakeholders to boost service delivery.

    Fashola, who was represented by the Deputy Governor, Mrs Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire, said: “ You are a major stakeholder on our road and l want to implore you to get familiar with the new traffic laws of the state. You are also expected to discharge your duties with sense of discipline as frontline officer in public service delivery. At all times, you are expected to demonstrate polite attitude towards the taxpaying citizens who are our employer.”

    He asked them to exemplify tolerance, humility, temperament in the face of provocation and abuse by the public.

    The Commissioner for the Environment, Mr Tunji Bello, said the sweepers are a major component in the bid by the state to eliminate the litter caused by ‘pure water’ sachets from the roads to the dump sites. He commended them for their invaluable contributions, which formed the pedestal for the workshop to protect them from road hazards by careless drivers and other road users.

    Bello, who was represented by the Special Adviser to the Governor on the Environment, Mr Taofeek Folami, said the workshop is an avenue for roles’ reappraisal and help towards the implementation of the various enhancement strategies planned by LAWMA.

    Earlier in his speech, LAWMA’ Managing Director, Ola Oresanya, said the street sweepers scheme was initially a poverty alleviation programme with the recruitment of over 10,000 persons who were deployed for intensive daily sweeping to achieve a clean environment in the state. He said their achievements on the state highways were being complemented through the introduction of marine services that are responsible for cleaning of shorelines and canals.

    Oresanya said their achievements have endeared them to not only the international community, but also corporate bodies who have extended grants and donations to them.

    However, he noted that though the programmme have lived up to its bidding, it has nevertheless, faced challenges in areas, such as the risk of infection and accidents on the highway due to the careless attitude of some motorists and motorcycle riders.

    As a way forward, the LAWMA boss disclosed the agency has completed arrangements to train some supervisors in the United Kingdom to broaden their knowledge in modern ways of cleaning the streets.

    Chairman, Service Providers Forum of LAWMA, Mr Akin Adewole, commended the governor for keeping his promise in raising the salary of the sweepers.

    On their challenges, he said the most daunting is that of medical care, recklessness of commercial drivers, which has resulted in deaths and permanent injuries to their members. He made a case for an insurance policy to encourage the sweepers.

  • ANLCA threatens terminal operators

    The Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents (ANLCA) has threatened to shut the seaports, unless terminal operators resolved the alleged increase in some charges on imported goods.

    The decision to close the ports was reached at a meeting of ANLCA’s trustees, national executives as well as chairmen and secretaries of chapters in the Western zone, last week.

    Ii was gathered that the association agreed that a four-member committee, comprising the secretary of the Board of Trustees; Prince Taiye Oyeniyi, Apapa Chapter Chairman; Comrade John Ofobike, Chairman, Tin Can Chapter; Mr Kayode Farinto Collins and secretary of the association’s Presidential Compliance Committee; Chief Isdore Martins Agoha was constituted to interface with the Seaports Terminal Operators Association of Nigeria (STOAN).

    The group, sources said, was mandated to write to the chairman of STOAN to resolve the issue or face its wrath.

  • N350b saved from contracts, procurement, says BPP boss

    N350b saved from contracts, procurement, says BPP boss

    The Bureau of Public Procurement(BPP) yesterday disclosed that about N350 billion has been saved from contracts and other procurement projects.

    This amount was saved through what the Bureau called, its “rigorous initiatives of standardising the contract and procurement processes in Federal Ministries, Departments and Agencies.”

    The Director-General, Emeka Ezeh, who stated this at the end of the fourth Conversion Training Programme for procurement officers in the MDAs, in Abuja , said the N350 billion was saved from 2007.

    Ezeh said his agency would not relent in its efforts at standardising Nigeria’s public sector procurement system, as it would help plug loopholes that promote corruption in the system.

    He described the savings as the “result of painstaking efforts by the agency to change the way things are being done in the procurement system, and ensure strict compliance with the provisions of the enabling Public Procurement Act 2007.”

    He said the training, is aimed at building the capacity of personnel charged with the responsibility of ensuring the implementation of the Act.

    He said BPP is determined to ensure that government gets value-for-money and that there is transparency and competition in the public contracting process.

    “We have been assured over time that we can hardly make progress without due process being our watchword in the way we spend government money,” he stated. This is one major way in which the much needed growth in infrastructure and utilities can be guaranteed”, he added.

  • Seplat boss expresses concern over passage of PIB

    The Managing Director, Seplat Petroleum Development Company Limited, Mr Austin Avuru, has expressed concern over the passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) into law.

    He said the bill would either not be passed into law after all or what would be passed would not be functional, which may lead to call for amendments from the day one.

    The development according to analysts, would not only further deepen investment diversion from the country to other countries but would at the same time jeopardize the entire country’s economy.

    Speaking with The Nation during the Petroleum Club Forum, which focused on the PIB, held in Lagos, Avuru regretted that the piece of draft legislation was rather widening the gap between the government and the industry rather than narrowing it, noting that in the end if no concrete consensus was reached on what is acceptable to both parties, it is the industry and the country that would suffer

    He said the discrepancies that existed between the international oil companies (IOCs) and what the government was trying to do have been the major challenge in all of the versions of the PIB. It doesn’t represent what we think it should be, he added.

    He said: “Right from the beginning when we decided for whatever good reason, that we have to go through this complex process of rewriting all existing legislation in the industry and put it into one piece of document, some of us knew from the beginning that it was going to produce more complications than solutions.”

    He said the objectives of both parties were completely different. According to him, while the government wanted more revenue the stakeholders were saying that too many complications had crept into the industry, which the Seplat chief agreed had increased the cost of doing business.

    “The business environment is much less stable than it was 15-17 years ago and that under this circumstance what we are getting out of the industry is just about enough and the government doesn’t want to listen to that. Government wants more, the industry is saying if you want more you are chasing us out of business,” he said.

    On whether the National Assembly would reach a compromise on the issue, Avuru said the government and the industry had failed to narrow their differences before taking a compromise document to the National Assembly adding that most of them took their very divergent views to the National Assembly and by judication what would come out of the house would be difficult to predict.

    “Where the industry and the government agencies including the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) could not close their gap and reach some compromise at this point what would come out of the National Assembly would be difficult to predict,” adding that the lawmakers may not have the broad training and experience to understand the intricacies of the issues in the industry.

    The Executive Director, Pillar Oil Limited, operator of Umuseti/Igbuku oilfield, Seye Fadahunsi, said that the PIB must put in place the opportunity for small companies to grow from small to midsize companies

    He agreed there was nothing in the draft that said any category of acreage would be reserved for indigenous players. He said there must be some form of encouragement that ensures that what the international oil companies don’t use, the local companies are able to use them to increase the size of the pile.

    He said the IOCs have given out over 100 acreages of twenty nine marginal fields in the history of indigenous operations in Nigeria and had only produced about five percent of total production.

    According to him, most of the licenses that were given to indigenous companies were licenses that the majors didn’t want, adding that the potential of those licenses were not necessarily that grade.

  • SAHCOL for Hajj operation

    The Skyway Aviation Handling Company Limited (SAHCOL) has received approval to provide ground handling services for outbound and inbound operations of the 2012 Hajj Operations, the spokesman of the company Mr Basil Agboarumi has said.

    By this, SAHCOL is expected to provide ground handling services, covering ramp, passenger and baggage to four airlines for the Hajj Operations. They include Marx Air, Kabo Air, Med View and Meridian Airlines.

    He explained that the services would be provided at the designated airports for the Hajj , namely, Lagos, Abuja, Kano, Port Harcourt, Maiduguri, Minna, Yola, Sokoto, Katsina, Ilorin, Gombe and Kaduna.

    Out of the 85, 000 pilgrims that would go through these airports, SAHCOL is expected to provide handling services to 65, 000 pilgrims.

    Meanwhile, SAHCOL has already deployed personnel and equipment to these stations to allow for a hitch-free Hajj.

    “The firm is geared towards ensuring efficient and speedy delivery of aviation ground handling services to its customers, thereby making SAHCOL a reference point where efficiency of a successful flight is born,” SAHCOL said in a statement.

    Since the takeover of SAHCOL by the SIFAX Group in December 2009, SAHCOL has invested in personnel development and state-of-the-art equipment, fleet replacement, and massive infrastructural development, which have helped reposition the company to meet the needs and expectations.

  • Infrastructure remains key to development, says commissioner

    Lagos Commissioner for Works and Infrastructure Dr Kadri Obafemi Hamzat has said the path to Nigeria’s greatness depends on its ability to develop the critical infrastructure for the economy.

    Hamzat stated this while on a tour of road projects in Eti-Osa Local Government.

    He said Nigeria could not fulfil its potential if it was unable to develop its road network, rail system and harness both its potential in the aviation and maritime sectors.

    According to the Commissioner, there is abundant evidence all over the world as to the need to build infrastructure. “Brazil has just recently announced infrastructure development package of about $63billion and it is not alone in the race”, he said.

    He stressed that the nation needs roads linking up all its regions on which the citizens can drive pleasurably based on its qualities and facilities.

    Hamzat said road construction efforts of the current administration in the State are a result of the belief that the quantum of economic development of any nation is closely tied to the quantum and quality of its infrastructure.

    Stressing that the obvious concentration on road is reflective of the fact that most of the movement of goods and services within the nation takes place on roads.

    While assuring that all the state’s projects are on course, the Commissioner noted that visible sign of project progress especially pedestrian bridges will only be felt when they are to be installed. He added that off-site castings are on-going.