*Gas reserves now 206.53tcf— DPR *Nigeria can hit 45,000MW— GE
The Federal Government has charged oil and gas industry operators to move beyond conferences and workshops to take concrete steps to develop Nigeria’s huge natural gas reserves.
This was as the Department of Petroleum Resources, DPR, announced that Nigeria’s proven gas reserves have grown to 206.53 trillion cubic feet.
The Minister of State Petroleum Resources, Chief Timipre Sylva who gave the charge at the ongoing Nigeria International Petroleum Summit, NIPS, in Abuja, said talk of Nigeria’s gas reserves are meaningless without any action to develop it.
He called on the industry to support government’s natural gas agenda that is intended to deliver gas powered economy by 2030.
“I want to see a holistic roadmap and action plan that provides the appropriate leverage for the way forward in delivering the Decade of Gas vision.
“The critical milestone that must be achieved should be clearly stated with short, medium and long term strategies,” he added.
Speaking at an earlier session, the Director of DPR, Engr. Sarki Auwalu disclosed that gas reserve has increased by 3.37tcf to 206.53tcf as at Jan.1, 2021.
Auwalu explained that the growth of gas reserves was a critical lever to achieving Federal Government’s “Decade of Gas Initiative” aimed at transforming Nigeria to a gas-powered economy by 2030.
According to him, “Nigeria attained the target of 200tcf of natural gas reserves by the Reserve Declaration as at Jan.1, 2019, before the 2020 target
“Thereafter, government set a target to attain a Reserve Position of 2020tcf by 2030.”
Also speaking, the Chairman of Nigeria Gas Association and Managing Director, Shell Nigeria Gas, Ed Ubong said a lot is needed to grow domestic usage of gas in Nigeria.
He said: “Today in Africa, gas only accounts for 5% of our energy mix, globally its 20% that is where the real opportunities is, how do we use gas to meet the energy needs of our people in Africa and Nigeria.
“Nigeria is sitting on a large, huge resource base of gas, but how much gas are we producing? We are a top ten country when we talk of what we have but when you talk of what we are actually producing we begin to sit back, we are in the top 20 range.
“Yes, we are producing gas but how much of gas are we consuming, using to drive our economy? Nigeria moves even further; we are now in the top 50. That is the dilemma, if you look at Nigeria today in the global landscape.
“The gas development in Nigeria has a number of positives. Over the last 30 years, we have doubled our domestic gas consumption and moved from about 200 and today in the domestic market we have close to 1.2pcf of gas flowing every day.
“Gas consumption needs to be accelerated. We must accelerate our consumption if we are able to utilise the gas we have over the limited period we have before the energy transition.”
Also speaking, President, GE Nigeria, Mohammed Mijindadi disclosed that Nigeria can generate as much as 45,000 Megawatts of power from its current gas reserves.
Mijindadi noted that Nigeria has a huge electricity market, stressing however that infrastructure needs to be built while the business environment needs to improve significantly.
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