Atlantic Energy Takes Part in Nigerian Oil and Gas Conference

Atlantic Energy was a platinum sponsor at the recently concluded 13th Nigerian Oil and Gas conference, one of Africa’s largest oil and gas conference held in Abuja was a gathering of over 1000 national and international senior level delegates from the Upstream, Midstream and Downstream sectors of the oil and gas industry.

Representatives including the Nigerian Minister of Petroleum Resources, H.E. Diezani Alison-Madueke; Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), represented by the Group Managing Director, Andrew Yakubu and Group Executive Director, Exploration & Production, Abiye Membere; International and Indigenous Oil Companies (IOCs), Service Companies; Nigerian and international banks amongst others.

The Co-Chief Executive Officer of Atlantic Energy, Mr. Scott Aitken chaired the panel discussion on the topic: “Focus on Independents – How are Indigenous Companies Transforming the Nigerian Oil and Gas Industry? Key points that were discussed included:

• Creating an enabling environment to encourage Nigerian companies to enter and expand operations;
• What are the fiscal and regulatory incentives that indigenous companies require?
• How can indigenous companies access the technical know-how and financing to further their operations?
• The divestment process from IOCs to indigenous companies successes and pitfalls

Mr. Aitken noted that while IOCs are responsible for over 90% of production in Nigeria, there are hundreds of undeveloped onshore discoveries, therefore, there is a need for more indigenous companies like Atlantic Energy to join in taking the Nigerian Oil and Gas industry forward.

He also noted that recently, the Nigerian government tasked the Nigerian Petroleum Development Company (NPDC), an operator (and fully owned subsidiary of the NNPC) who are in a strategic alliance with Atlantic Energy to develop a number of NPDC’s assets to drastically increase its production of crude oil and natural gas.

NPDC has 130,000 barrels of oil per day (bopd) of current production with a target of reaching 250,000 bopd by 2015 and significantly increasing the supply of domestic gas to the country to enable an increase in power generation and support local manufacturing industries. Atlantic Energy through its Strategic Alliance with NPDC, will assist NPDC attain this target.

Additionally, he stated that a significant portion of the Nigeria’s marketed natural gas is processed into LNG and this natural gas only constituted 4% of the country’s energy consumption as at 2010; however, the power sector privatization is driving an increased demand for gas, with an installed capacity of 7,000 MW and a target capacity of 16,000 MW by the end of 2013.

Mr. Aitken further stated the challenges facing companies like Atlantic Energy and the wider industry and proffered solutions to the problems raging from old infrastructure, Swamp and land terrain, community stakeholder relationships and expectations, multiple partners/new models, to ambitious targets can be addressed through detailed evaluation and phased infrastructure replacement/upgrade, encouragement of swamp and land terrain asset management, community engagements and updates should be assessed, there should be project prioritization and clear centralization management structures including strong relationship building and there is a need to have fast track solutions to deliver early results to fund further development.

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LNG World News Staff, March 06, 2013; Image: cwcnog