FG Awards $2.5bn Contracts under Gas Master Plan

Minister of Power, Barth Nnaji

As part of the implementation of the Nigeria Gas Master Plan that seeks to attract over $30billion investment in gas infrastructure that will harness gas for power and other industrial uses, the Federal Government has so far awarded over $2.5billion contracts for gas pipeline projects.

Group Executive Director in charge of Gas and Power at the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Dr. David Ige, stated this at a recent oil and gas conference in Abuja.

Ige said the award of the contracts was in line with government’s commitment to harness the country’s abundance gas resources.

He identified some of the contracts to include: Oben-Geregu – 363 136kilometre pipeline project, which was completed in 2011 at the value of $245.31million;  the Olorunsogo – 243  41kilometre  pipeline, which will be completed this month at a value of $54.04million and the ECPS-A – 101kilometre pipeline that will completed in the next few weeks at a cost of $258million.
Other projects include the ELPS 2 – 263  324kilometre m project, which will be completed in November  at a contract value of $382.39million and the Oben/Ob – 127kilometre that will be completed in 2014 at a cost of $662.26million.

The rest of the projects, according to Ige, is the Imo River – 24km pipeline that was awarded at a cost of $52.94million; the Qua Iboe Terminal QIT/Obigbo – 54kilometre pipeline awarded at a cost of $153million and the Oso/QIT – 51kilometre pipeline valued at $235million, among others.
Ige noted that 2012 would be the most trying moment for the power sector due to challenges of gas supply.

The disruption of supply of over 200million standard cubic of gas per day to power plants recently led to a drop in electricity supply in the country by 625megawatts.
Before the gas supply worsened, power supply had peaked at 4,400megawatts.

The power plants affected by the gas shortage include: Egbin Power Station in Lagos, Sapele Power Station, which is operated under the National Independent Power Project and Ughelli Station both in Delta State.

Others include: Geregu in Kogi State, Omotosho in Ondo State and Olorunsogo (Phase2) in Ogun State.

According to the Minister of Power, Prof. Bart Nnaji, gas supply to the Escravos—Lagos Pipeline System (ELPS) which provides natural gas to key thermal power stations in the country has declined by over 180m standard cubic feet in the last few days.

He further disclosed that the Oben gas facility in Delta State, which feeds the western axis was  shut down recently at the instance of the Shell Petroleum Development Company (SPDC) so as to carry out a leakage repair on the Ughelli—Sapele line.

Nnaji said as a result of this development, 1200mscf of gas from Seplat, an indigenous upstream operator, is now stranded.

This development came on the heels of the ongoing maintenance work on the Chevron compressor in  Escravos, Delta State, which began last week and has caused a loss of 30mscf.