FID to be taken next week ― NNPC
By Michael Eboh
Nigeria LNG Limited, NLNG, yesterday, signed a 20-year agreement with Joint Venture, JV, companies and major gas producers for the supply of feedgas to its proposed Train 7.
In addition, Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, Mallam Mele Kyari, disclosed that the Final Investment Decision on the NLNG Train 7 project would be taken next week.
In a statement in Abuja, General Manager, External Relations of the NLNG, Mrs Eyono Fatayi-Williams, stated that the NLNG also signed the second Basic 10-year term of Gas Supply Agreements, GSA, for its Trains 1, 2 and 3.
According to her, the first Basic 20-year term of GSAs for NLNG Train 7 with the Joint Venture companies brought the NLNG closer to taking FID, which signals the commencement of the project, which is expected to increase the company’s production by 35 per cent and improve competitiveness in the global market upon completion.
She listed the JV companies like Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited (SPDC), Total Exploration & Production Nigeria (TEPNG) and Nigerian Agip Oil Company Limited (NAOC).
The milestone, she said, was coming after the issuance of a Letter of Intent for the Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) Contract to SCD JV Consortium in September 2019 as well as the signing of the Nigeria Content (NC) plan with Nigerian Content Development Monitoring Board (NCDMB) in March 2019.
SCD JV Consortium, according to her, is made up of Saipem of Italy, Japan’s Chiyoda and Daewoo of South Korea.
She explained that the Train 7 Project would ramp up NLNG’s production capacity from 22 million tonnes per annum (MTPA) to around 30 MTPA.
The NLNG spokesperson insisted that the project would form part of the investment of over $10 billion, including the upstream scope of the LNG value chain, thereby boosting the much needed Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) profile of Nigeria.
She said: “The project is anticipated to create over 10,000 new jobs during its construction phase, and on completion, help to further mop more gas that would have been flared, and diversify the revenue portfolio of the Federal Government and thus increase its tax base.”
She added that the project was in line with its corporate vision of helping to build a better Nigeria, adding that the construction period after FID would last approximately four to five years.
Fatayi-Williams disclosed that the actualisation of the Train 7 project comes as NLNG celebrates 30 years of its incorporation and 20 years since exporting its first LNG cargo in 1999.
Also speaking on the significance of the execution of the GSA, Kyari, disclosed that with the agreement in place, all was set for the take-off of the project.
Kyari said the project would boost Federal Government’s revenue by $9 billion and generate about 10,000 direct jobs and 40,000 indirect jobs to ease the youth unemployment challenge in the country.
The highpoint of the event was the signing of the GSA by all the parties and the signing of Term Sheet for the development of Oil Mining Lease, OML 144 by NNPC, SPDC, TEPNG, NAOC and Sunlink.
Vanguard