Nigeria’s oil production is expected to increase again as Shell Petroleum Development Company Limited (SPDC) hinted yesterday that its 400,000 barrels per day (bpd) Forcados Oil Terminal would resume export operations by the end of this month, following months of underproduction and a significant drop in foreign exchange earnings from oil export due to crude theft and vandalism.
The oil major predicted that by then, the facility’s ongoing critical repairs would have been finished and normal export operations would have started.
In a statement released Wednesday, SPDC’s media relations manager, Abimbola Essien-Nelson, said, “In addition to the repairs, we are working to remove and clamp theft locations on the onshore pipelines to assure full crude oil receipt at the port.”
Due to ongoing oil theft that Shell claimed constituted a “existential threat” to its integrity, the Forcados Oil Terminal Offtake Program had been put on hold.
According to Essien-Nelson, the active illegal connections to SPDC joint venture’s production lines and facilities in western Niger Delta as well as the inactive illegal connection to the onshore section of the 48.” Forcados Export Line are in the company’s on-going programme to remove illegal connections on the pipelines that feed the terminal.
She said, “SPDC gives priority to the removal of active illegal connections and to illegal connection points that have leaks. This scheduled programme is continuous as new illegal connections are identified during surveillance of the pipelines.
According to Global research and consultancy group, Wood Mackenzie (WoodMac), the terminal has an oil export capacity of 400,000 barrels per (bpd).
It described the Forcados Oil Pipeline System as, “the second largest network in the Niger Delta, and transports oil, water and associated gas from fields in the western delta to the Forcados oil terminal.
