Our Reporter: ADEWALE SANYAOLU
With three new gas joint venture projects set to come on stream by 2015, Shell Petroleum Development Corporation (SPDC) has indicated its willingness to achieve more than 80 per cent in gas flare out next year.
The planned move to end gas flares-out while also putting it to better use was disclosed by Director, Gas, SPDC, Mr. Ubaka Emelumadu, at the 32nd Annual International Conference and Exhibition of Nigerian Association of Petroleum Explorationists (NAPE), which opened in Lagos yesterday.
The new gas projects are to come on stream in Forcados Yokri, Adibawa and Otumara/Saghara.
Emelumadu, in his presentation, ‘‘Obstacles to Developing Gas Infrastructure in Nigeria,” explained that SPDC Joint Ventures (JV) has made good progress by successfully reducing volume of gas flared as well as gas flaring intensity by 60 per cent over the last decade.
“While this means less threat to the environment, it also means more gas infrastructure for the country and increase in gas sales to the domestic economy. In the next one year, more of SPDC JV gas flares-out projects (Forcados Yokri, Adibawa and Otumara/Saghara) will come on stream as we intend to achieve more than 80 per cent reduction by 2015,” he said.
The Gas Director informed that Nigeria ranks next to Russia as the country with the most flared gas, adding that since 2000, there has been progress made in flares reduction while the industry has seen a year on year reduction that trails SPDC, which has been reducing flares by 12 per cent faster than the industry average.
He said past focus on small associated gas gathering infrastructure proved expensive and presented some challenges because the rate of return on investment was not competitive compared to development of huge reserves or oil development.
However, he said it must be acknowledged that Nigeria and other stakeholders have made considerable progress in reducing gas flaring in the past decade, surpassing countries like Russia and Iraq, with Shell playing a key role albeit the unique challenge of executing such infrastructure.
Source : SunOnline