BEVERLY HILLS, February 15, (THEWILL) – The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has disclosed that it would henceforth give priority attention to ongoing gas projects that would enhance power supply in the country.
This has been revealed by Farouk Said, Group General Manager, Gas Infrastructure Development, NNPC, while receiving the Senate Committee on Gas, which was on an oversight visit to the NNPC Towers in Abuja.
Said noted that the NNPC was currently undertaking six priority gas projects that would reposition the country for profitability and expressed determination of the government owned corporation to complete all of the projects aimed at linking gas-to-power and gas-to-industries to boost the national economy.
Said explained that the current gas infrastructure projects being executed were in tandem with the Gas Master Plan, which was approved by the last Federal Executive Council, adding that the plan would have a spin-off effect on the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the country.
“In line with the mandate of GID, we are currently executing six critical gas infrastructure projects. Four of them are pipeline projects; the others are the Gas Revolution Industrial Park (GRIP) and the Western and Central Processing Plants,” Said said.
“The Escravos Lagos Pipeline System II (ELPS) is a 36-inch diameter and 342-kilometre pipeline that traverses Delta, Edo, Ondo, Ogun and Lagos states,” he said, stressing that the project is expected to be commissioned in the second quarter of this year.
He noted that when completed, the ELPS II would double the capacity of the existing ELPS, which currently supplies 1.1 trillion standard cubic feet of gas per day, noting that the pipeline would serve as a back bone of power supply as most of the power plants were located along the ELPS axis.
On the GRIP, he noted that “we have completed concept master plan; we have also done ground-breaking ceremony. We have cleared 535 hectares of the land out of the 585 hectares earmarked for GRIP.
“Nigeria Export Processing Zone Authority (NEPZA) has also appointed a developer and an alignment meeting has been scheduled for the end of February 2016, where all the stakeholders would get together including the investors to factor the way forward for the project.”
Earlier, Maikanti Baru, Group Executive Director, Exploration and Production, NNPC, said the gas infrastructural projects when completed would boost power supply, generate employment and provide a veritable platform for export of petrochemical products from Nigeria.
Bassey Albert Akpan, chairman of the Senate Committee, in his remarks, said the visit was an eye opener, assuring that the Senate was prepared to support strategic efforts of the NNPC to industrialise Nigeria.
“We encourage the management of NNPC to remain focused on the critical gas infrastructure, the continued display of transparency and accountability in its business module implementation,” Akpan said.
Story by David Oputah
