Crude oil theft pushes production to 1.1million barrels per day, says FG

The Federal Government (FG) had stated that the menace of crude oil theft has pushed production to 1.1million barrels per day.

It said despite having the capacity to meet the national oil production target set by OPEC at 1.8mbd, the country losses 80,000 barrels to 100,000 barrels daily to theft

The Chief Executive of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), Engr. Gbenga Komolafe made the disclosure at a briefing in Abuja yesterday.

He pointed out that while crude oil theft has hampered oil production pushing it down to 1.1mbd, the government was doing everything possible to scale up production.

Also, he said the downtime being experienced along the forcados line has added to the depressed oil production.

Komolafe however said, “We have been engaging with the NNPC Limited and we are optimistic that with the re-streaming of the Forcados line, which has a production capacity of 400,000 barrels, we will have about 1.5mbpd.”

He noted that the restoration of the Forcados Crude oil pipeline and the reopening of half of the shut-in oil streams will take the country close to meeting OPEC’s quota.

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On the implementation of the Oil Host Community Trust Funds, Engr. Komolafe, noted that the enactment of the Petroleum Industry Act 2021 officially made host communities stakeholders in the oil and gas business.

He disclosed that the process for the appointment of trustees for host community funds has begun, adding that very soon the funds would become operations.

On the achievement of the Commission in its first year of existence, he said: “the Commission has achieved fundamental milestones in our mandate. We were focused on laying a solid foundation for our regulatory functions and in pursuing that, we have drafted the Environmental Remediation Fund Regulation and the Upstream Environmental Regulation and Upstream Petroleum Safety Regulation, both of which have been subjected to stakeholder review in line with the PIA.

“The Commission also successfully launched the Host Communities Regulations to guide the implementation and operationalisation of the Host Communities Development Trust, as also enshrined in the PIA. The Commission is putting in place modalities to ensure the smooth take-off of the various Trusts in a timely manner.”