TotalEnergies Group on Monday revealed that it has invested approximately $10 billion dollars in Nigeria in recent years, as the country remains one of its major operations hubs that accounts for 12% of its equity production.
The company added that through decades of executing development projects, its activities have contributed to creating jobs and developing human capacity in Nigeria.
The Deputy Managing Director, Deepwater District, Total E&P, Mr Victor Bandele made the revelation at the opening of the 20th edition of the Nigeria Oil and Gas Conference (NOG) holding in Abuja.
Represented by Olalere Babasola, Executive General Manager, Government Relations of the company, the Total E&P DMD noted that the theme of the conference; “Expanding the Nigerian Content Frontier through Intra-African Trade” remains apt and timely, as it provides a great opportunity for the continuation of a conversation that the industry must sustain.
According to him, TotalEnergies, in the upstream sector, has a broad and diversified portfolio in Nigeria, with activities spanning onshore, conventional offshore, deep water and LNG.
He noted that the Egina Project is TotalEnergies’ third deep offshore
Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) project in Nigeria, after the successful delivery of AKPO project (2009) and USAN project (2012).
He added that the projects have brought progressive increase in levels of Nigerian Content, and Egina, being the first major project launched after the enactment of the Nigerian Oil & Gas Industry Content Development (NOGICD) Act of 2010, has so far the highest level of local content of any FPSO project in Nigeria:
“On December 29, 2018, Egina first oil was achieved with the opening of the first production well on the South Loop. With a capacity of 200,000 barrels of oil per day, Egina has increased Nigeria’s oil production by 10%.
“Ikike field development lies within Nigeria offshore block OML 99 (Amenam-Kpono), situated 20 km offshore, in 20m water depth and approximately 15 km north of the Amenam complex. It is outside the AMENAM unitized area in joint venture partnership with NNPC (NNPC-60% /TEPNG-40%).
The Ikike field is being developed as a satellite tieback to Amenam.
Despite its size and scope, our Nigerian Content objectives for Ikike are not any less ambitious.
Our overall target is to achieve 90% Nigerian Content on Ikike with 100% of project management based in-country; 100% of detailed & basic engineering in Nigeria; 100% of procurement by local firms; 3,000 direct jobs; Refresher/On-the-job training for 53 NCDMB trainees; entry level training of 80 Geoscience students as well as infrastructure development support to some schools” he explained.
Bandele hailed the passage of the NOGICD Act that that enabled Nigeria to build Africa’s first FPSO integration quay as well as built and installed six entire FPSO topside modules on Egina.
“What African countries need to do, as a matter of urgency, is to open the continent to freer exchange of capacity and trade among one another.
“I see a great opportunity for intra-continental collaboration when the NCDMB collaborates with sister local content authorities in the continent to share ideas, capacities, and competencies. Nigeria has a lot to export to other African countries in the area of local content”.
Bandele urged African nations to leverage on the opportunities provided by the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA) to stimulate competitive manufacturing, as Africa’s manufacturing sector will have the potential to double in size from $500 billion in 2015 to $1 trillion in 2025, creating 14 million stable jobs.
Also speaking at the event, the Chairman Senate Committee on Local Content, Teslim Folarin said that the National Assembly has remained supportive of local content matters considering its transformative potential.
He recalled that before the NCDMB Act came to force in 2010 only five per cent Nigerians participated in oil and gas production; as offshore players took a chunk of $20 billion contracts therein.
For the Executive Secretary, NCDMB, Mr Simbi Wabote hailed the national assembly for passing the PIB Petroleum Industry Bill, describing it as one that will bring prosperity to the country.
