TheCable

Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) says export operations have commenced at the Forcados oil terminal.

Abimbola Essien-Nelson, SPDC’s media relations manager, disclosed this to NAN on Friday in Lagos.

In August, Shell began repairing a subsea hose which stopped exports of Forcados crude, one of the country’s largest export grades. 

SPDC had said that the Forcados oil terminal would resume export operations by the end of October when the ongoing essential repairs would have been completed.

The Forcados export pipeline, which has the capacity to export over 400,000 barrels of crude per day, was vandalised by crude oil thieves.

The vandalism hampered its functionality, thereby hindering the transportation of crude oil through the pipeline to the export terminal.

The Forcados oil pipeline system is the second largest network in the Niger Delta and moves oil and associated gas from fields in the western Delta to the Forcados oil terminal.

The Trans Forcados Pipeline (TFP) is the major trunk line, which feeds multiple branches from onshore fields.

The country has been grappling with low production in the face of lingering oil theft and pipeline vandalism.

Recently, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC) said it uncovered an illegal 4-kilometre (km) pipeline from Forcados terminal to the sea and a loading port that had operated for nine years.

In September, crude production slumped to 937,766 barrels per day (bpd).