by
The Nigeria National Petroleum Company Limited, NNPCL, and TotalEnergies Joint Venture have officially announced a $550 million Final Investment Decision (FID) on the Ubeta Field Development Project to boost Nigeria’s oil and gas production.
The spokesperson of NNPCL, Olufemi Soneye, disclosed this in a statement on Thursday.
According to NNPCL, the milestone is in line with President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s Presidential Executive Order on Oil and Gas Reforms aimed largely at improving the investment climate and positioning Nigeria as the preferred investment destination for the oil and gas sector in Africa.
The Ubeta field, discovered in 1964, North-West of Port Harcourt in the eastern part of the Niger Delta, will, once on stream, produce about 350 million standard cubic feet per day of gas and 10,000 barrels per day of associated liquids, tapping into the vast gas reserves and contributing towards securing gas supply to Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas, NLNG, Limited.
The statement noted that the signing ceremony was held at the NNPC Towers, where the Group Chief Executive Officer of NNPCL, Mallam Mele Kyari, lauded stakeholders for facilitating the project.
“We appreciate Mr President for supporting us with the appropriate fiscal environment. The Presidential Executive Order is instrumental to us getting to this significant milestone, and we are now seeing the impact of the policy,” Kyari added.
In his remarks, TotalEnergies’ Senior Vice President of Africa, Exploration and Production, Mike Sangster, said: “Ubeta is the latest in a series of projects developed by TotalEnergies in Nigeria, most recently, Ikike and Akpo West. I am pleased that we can launch this new gas project which has been made possible by the Government’s recent incentives for non-associated gas developments. Ubeta fits perfectly with our strategy of developing low-cost and low-emission projects and will contribute to the Nigerian economy through higher NLNG exports.”
Earlier in his remarks, the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources (Oil), Heineken Lokpobiri, and his counterpart for Gas, Ekperikpe Ekpo, said President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has significantly rekindled investor confidence in the oil and gas industry, assuring Nigerians that more investments are on the way.
The Ubeta gas condensate field will be developed with a new 6-well cluster connected to the existing Obite facilities through an 11-km buried pipeline.
Accordingly, NNPCL said the production start-up is expected in 2027, with a plateau of 300 million cubic feet per day (about 70,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day including condensates).
