Bonga, OPL 245 developments back in one year, says Kachikwu

Emmanuel Ibe Kachikwu, Nigeria’s minister of state for Petroleum Resources has said that Bonga FPSO suspended by Shell Nigeria Exploration Production Company (SNEPCO) two months ago to allow for turnaround maintenance, and further development of OPL 245 are expected to start in a year’s time.

“We are beginning to see a lot of our big projects come back, Bonga is getting ready to move, Agip is getting ready to move on with their own projects, we are looking at looking at return of projects of $15 and $20billion dollars over the next year,” said Kachikwu in an interview monitored on Bloomberg shortly before joining the OPEC meeting in Vienna, Thursday.

This could signal the return of over 200,000 barrels per day production and 150 million standard cubic feet of gas per day, in the Bonga field operated under a Production Sharing Contract with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC).
Further development of the $13.5 billion Zabazaba Deepwater project located in Oil Prospecting Lease (OPL) 245 will also raise Nigeria’s exports.

Earlier in April, Nigerian Agip Exploration Ltd, began receiving commercial proposals for the development of the controversial multi-billion Deepwater oil field,  a Greenfield offshore licence block located in the in the eastern portion of the Niger Delta with water depths ranging from 1,200 to 2,400 metres.

This could raise Nigeria’s oil project above 2 million barrels per day and complicates further Nigeria’s arguments to get exemptions, something Kachikwu says the country is not averse to.

“We are targeting that by the end of the extension period (9 months) we are trying to prep and finalise repairs of our infrastructure and at that time we would be able to join. We have to wait and see that the militancy effects are out and the infrastructure is rebuilt and we’re back to production,” he said.

The Oil Cartel, agreed to extend cuts in oil output by nine months to March 2018, to reduce a global glut of crude in the market after seeing prices halve and revenues drop sharply in the past three years.