NNPC TO SUPPORT NGA DELIVER ON NIGERIA’S GAS RESOURCE

The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), will support the Nigerian Gas Association (NGA), achieve its objectives of ensuring that the country derives maximum benefit from its huge gas resource base.

 

Maikanti Baru, goroup managing director of the NNPC, speaking on Thursday in Abuja while receiving the NGA delegation led by its President, Bolaji Osunsanya, at the NNPC noted that as the midwife of the nation’s premier gas association in 1999, the NNPC has a moral and strategic interest in ensuring the continuous existence and sustained growth of the association.

 

Read more @ BusinessDay

GOVERNMENT RECEIVES $33B FROM NLNG

The Federal Government has reaped over $33 billion from the Nigeria LNG Limited (NLNG) initial investment of $2.5 billion.
Managing Director of the company, Babs Omotowa, disclosed this yesterday in Abuja while briefing the House of Representatives Committee on Gas Resources during a public hearing on a bill to amend the NLNG Act.

Read more @ The Guardian

I will be petroleum minister, says Buhari

As the nation awaits President Muhammadu Buhari’s ministerial list, the President on Tuesday said he would head the Ministry of Petroleum Resources.

 

Buhari dropped the hint in one of the interviews he granted one of the foreign media in his hotel shortly before departing New York.

Read more @ Punch Online

 

STOP FIXING FUEL PRICES, NNPC, OTHERS TELL FG

The fixing of petroleum products’ prices is denying the country investment in the downstream sector of the oil and gas industry and depriving Nigerians certain benefits from the country’s petroleum resources, industry stakeholders said on Thursday.

The Federal Government currently regulates the prices of Premium Motor Spirit, otherwise known as petrol, and kerosene, and subsidises their prices to enable Nigerians to get the products at the regulated prices.

 

Read more @ Punch Online

 

 

EXPERTS CANVASS GAS MASTER PLAN REVIEW, LICENSING ROUND

The Nigerian Gas Master Plan, which came on stream seven years ago, should be amended and licensing round should be carried out to expand access to gas reserves for development, industry operators and experts have said.

 

The NGMP, which was approved in February 2008, was designed to optimise the vast gas resources in the country, with key strategies being to stimulate the multiplier effect of gas in the domestic economy; position Nigeria competitively in high-value export markets, and guarantee long-term energy security in the country.

 

Read more @ Punch Online

NNPC SLAMMED FOR FAILING TO RECOVER FULL VALUE FOR OIL

The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation,(NNPC) has come under a fresh barrage of criticism for failing to recover full value for oil sold on behalf of the country over many years.

 

The Natural Resource Governance Institute (NRGI), a US based independent non profit organisation, in a report released yesterday, said the NNPC’s failure stems from poorly structured deals and unaccountable spending.

 

Read more @ Businessday online

WE’VE FOUND BANKS WITH STOLEN OIL MONEY – BUHARI

President Muhammadu Buhari, yesterday, in Abuja said that his administration has identified banks, financial institutions and countries in which payments for stolen Nigerian crude oil have been deposited.

Speaking at an audience with visiting United States Congressmen, President Buhari acknowledged the support and cooperation his administration was getting from the international community in gathering required intelligence for tracing and recovering stolen national resources.

Read more @ Vanguard

NIGERIA’S UNTAPPED GAS RESERVES AND DECLINING CRUDE OIL FORTUNES

With 188 trillion standard cubic feet (SCF), of gas resources, making Nigeria the seventh most endowed gas nation in the world and number one in Africa, the nation could have been immuned from the plummeting crude oil business if strategies focus had been made on this strategic option

Oil and gas experts believed that Nigeria could even earn more from full utilisation of gas resources than what it is currently been realised from crude oil exports.

Read more @ The Guardian

OPEC BEWARE: WEST AFRICA COULD LEAD THE WORLD’S NEXT PRODUCTION BOOM

During the early 1970s, Saudi Arabia cut production as a reminder that it held the cards to the world’s petroleum resources. What the swing country did not count on was the slew of development and production that would subsequently take place in the North Sea. As a result, a new oil supply was born far away from the Middle East. Fast forward to today: With oil saturating the market again, Saudi Arabia has kept its spigots on this time to try and prove once again its place on top of the hydrocarbon pyramid.

Read more @ Sweetcrude Report

HOW NPDC OUTSOURCES OPERATORSHIP OF DIVESTED OIL BLOCKS

More revelations have emerged on how the Nigerian Petroleum Development Company (NPDC) uses other contractors or Operations and Maintenance (O&M) contractors to run the oil blocks where it claims operatorship because it lacks financial, technical and adequate human resources to operate the assets.

The former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke had withdrawn the operatorship of some of the oil blocks divested by Shell and other International Oil Companies (IOCs) from the NPDC, a subsidiary of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and opted for Joint Operatorship Model (JOM) with the new owners of the assets, following the perceived poor performance of NPDC.

 

Read more @ Thisdaylive

NBS TO DETERMINE PETROLEUM PRODUCTS' CONSUMPTION PATTERN

The National Bureau of Statistics on Monday unveiled plans to carry out a survey of the consumption of gas and petroleum products in the country. The survey, which will be carried out from May 27, is designed to build a robust oil and gas database for policy formulation and strategic planning for sustainable development in the sector.

 

Speaking at the opening session of a stakeholders’ meeting on the survey, the Statistician-General of the Federation, Dr. Yemi Kale, said the idea to carry out the survey had been approved by the Ministry of Petroleum Resources.

 

Read more @ Punchonline

'INDEPENDENT OIL FIRMS AVOID PAYMENT OF ROYALTIES, TAXES'

The independent oil and gas companies may have been infringing on the nation’s petroleum regulations with the high level of defaults in payment of royalties and taxes on the operated oil fields.

The Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), which revealed this at the ongoing Nigeria Oil and Gas Conference and Exhibition (NOG) in Abuja, yesterday, said the indigenous upstream operators have failed to perform their operational obligations, particularly in the areas of taxes and royalties.

Read more @ Guardian

FG LOSES REVENUE TO NON-RENEWAL OF OIL LICENCES

The delay in the renewal of expired onshore and shallow-water licences held by International Oil Companies is said to be denying the Federal Government additional revenue at a time that its resources are fast shrinking.

 

The IOCs have, however, continued to produce from the Oil Mining Licences, some of which expired seven years ago.

 

Red more @ Punch Online

SENATE C'TTEE PROPOSES PRIVATIZATION OF REFINERIES

The Senate Joint Committee on the Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB, yesterday, disclosed that it has finished working on the Bill and is proposing the privatisation of Nigeria’s four refineries two years after the passage of the Bill.

Just as the lower chamber, the House of Rep Petroleum Resources Minister, Mrs. Deziani Alison-Madueke showing a copy of the authentic Petroleum Industry Bill to the Niger Delta Minister, Elder Godsday Orubebe and the Minister of State Niger
.
Read more @ Vanguard

HOUSE SUMMONS ALISON-MADUEKE, SHELL OVER DIVESTMENT FROM OIL BLOCK

The House of Representatives has resolved to investigate the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke, and the Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) over allegations of sharp practices in the divestment of Oil Mining Lease (OML) 11 by the Anglo-Dutch oil multinational.

Prompted by a motion sponsored by Hon. Uzoma Nkem Abonta (PDP, Abia), the House would probe the circumstances surrounding Shell’s exit from the said oil block and host communities knowing how interested it was in the build-up to the acquisition process.

 

Read more @ ThisdayLive

ALISON-MADUEKE MEETS MARKETERS TO AVERT FUEL CRISIS

In a move to avert a looming scarcity of petroleum products in the country, the Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke, on Monday met with the Chief Executive Officers of Oil Marketing and Trading (OM and T) companies in Lagos.

The protracted meeting which lasted from noon till late in the evening, was held at the Eko Hotel behind closed doors to find solutions to the threats by the banks and marketers to stop financing and importing products, respectively.

 

Read more @ Thisdaylive

NNPC TO REMIT $1.48BN AFTER RECONCILIATION WITH DPR

The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) yesterday said it would remit an outstanding $1.48 billion balance of signature bonus from divested assets to its exploration and production arm, the Nigeria Petroleum Development Company (NPDC) as soon as it reconciles the figures with the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR).

NNPC stated at a briefing on the outcome of the forensic audit conducted by PriceWaterHouseCoopers (PwC) on crude oil revenues accrued to the country between January 2012 and July 2013 and which the former Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Governor, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi accused it of failing to remit outstanding proceeds from crude oil sales into the federation account, that the $1.48 billion is the balance of its remittance to the government on NPDC’s signature bonus.

 

Read more @ Thisdaylive

NIGERIA RECORDS ZERO OIL EXPLORATION IN FOUR MONTHS

Between July and October this year, there was no single case of crude oil exploration in the country.

Between January and June this year, the country recorded five exploration activities in the upstream half of the petroleum industry, according to the Department of Petroleum Resources

Read more @ The Punch

ALISON-MADUEKE EMERGES PRESIDENT OF GAS EXPORTING NATIONS’ FORUM

It was another honour yesterday for Nigeria’s Minister of Petroleum Resources, Mrs. Diezani Alison-Madueke as she was appointed President of the Ministerial Meeting of the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF), the first woman to be so named by the body.

The fresh appointment is coming barely three weeks after her election as the first female President of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).

Read more @ The Guardian

VALUATIONS TO DROP AS OIL & GAS DIVESTMENT ACTIVITY ENTERS INTO BUYERS’ MARKET

The oil and gas industry is entering into a buyers’ market with more measured valuations, as the oil price slump impacts divestment and M&A deals in 2015.

According to Rolake Akinkugbe, VP and head, Energy and Natural Resources at FBN Capital, “Divestment deals forecast in the Nigerian market in 2015 are probably more in the region of $1-$2.5bn, much smaller than in recent years, due to the depressed global oil price environment.

Read more @ Businessday