TheCable

The Nigerian National Petroleum Company (NNPC) Limited has announced the successful commencement of oil production from the Akpo West field, in Port Harcourt, Rivers state.

According to a statement on Wednesday by Femi Soneye, NNPC’s spokesperson, this is in line with President Bola Tinubu’s directive to the national oil company to optimise production from Nigeria’s oil and gas assets.

The milestone, the NNPC spokesperson said, is the result of careful preparation, strategic cooperation, and unwavering dedication from all stakeholders. 

He said the commencement of production will add 14,000 barrels per day of condensate to the country’s production.

“This will be followed up by the production of about 4 million cubic meters of gas per day by 2028,” he said. 

“The development of Akpo West which is on Petroleum Mining Lease (PML) 2 (formerly OML 130) leverages the existing Akpo Floating Production Storage and Offloading (FPSO) facility via a subsea tie-back to keep costs low and minimises greenhouse gas emissions.”

The achievement, Soneye said, was enabled by the strategic leadership of Mele Kyari, NNPC group chief executive officer (GCEO), and the upstream directorate of the company “whose support played no small role in propelling the operators to actualise the short- and mid-term hydrocarbon production goals of the President Tinubu administration”.

Located 135 kilometres offshore, Akpo West is one of the discoveries on PML 2 close to the Akpo main — which began operations in 2009 and produced 124,000 barrels of oil equivalent per day in 2023.

PML 2 is operated by TotalEnergies with a 24 percent interest, in partnership with China National Offshore Oil Corp (CNOOC) (45 percent), Sapetro (15 percent), Prime 130 (16 percent), and the NNPC as the concessionaire of the production sharing contract (PSC).