Page 12 - AfrOil Week 25 2021

AfrOil PROJECTS & COMPANIES AfrOil

Subsequently, it extended the closure until July Even so, the extension of the maintenance pro-
following the discovery of damage to one of the gramme caused Algeria’s LNG exports to drop
plant’s 14 turbines in February. to 10.9mn tonnes in 2020, equivalent to just 43%
Sonatrach opted last year to repair the tur- of the 25.3 tpy operational export capacity of the
bine rather than replace it, as the replacement Skikda and Arzew plants.
process would have kept the Skikda facility out According to S&P Global Platts, Algeria
of production for 18 months. It also sought to has already exported some 6.22mn tonnes of
compensate for the loss of the plant’s capacity by LNG so far in 2021. This is equivalent to 50%
increasing the volume of LNG exported from of the country’s total nameplate capacity, Platts
Arzew, the site of another gas liquefaction plant. reported. ™

NLNG launches work on Train 7 project

NIGERIA NIGERIA LNG (NLNG) has formally begun project was in line with his government’s efforts
work on the Train 7 project, which is slated to to promote the production and domestic
expand the consortium’s total production capac- consumption of natural and associated gas.
ity to 30mn tonnes per year (tpy). “Through [the] ‘Decade of Gas’ initiative which
The group marked the start of construction I recently launched, we will transform Nigeria
at a ceremony last week. The event was attended into a natural gas and industrial nation, with
by Tony Attah, NLNG’s managing director, as gas playing the key role and revenue earner,” he
well as Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari. declared.
Attah said at the event that the project would Additionally, Buhari noted that NLNG has
cost about $10bn and directly create 12,000 new racked up $114bn in earnings since its launch
jobs. He also stated that the Train 7 initiative in 1999. The consortium had also paid $9bn in
would help Nigerian companies develop the taxes and $18bn in dividends to the Nigerian
capacity to provide more support for the oil and government over the same period, he added.
gas sector. Nigeria’s federal government is represented
This is because 100% of the fabrication, con- in NLNG by state-owned Nigerian National
struction work and major procurement will be Petroleum Corp. (NNPC), which has a stake of
carried out within Nigeria, he explained. 49%. The remaining equity in the group is split
Buhari, who attended the ceremony via between Royal Dutch Shell (UK/Netherlands),
video link, also stressed the potential benefits with 25.6%; TotalEnergies (France), with 15%,
for Nigerian businesses. The project will help and Eni (Italy), with 10.4%.
demonstrate that local companies are capable The partners operate a gas liquefaction plant
of carrying out large-scale initiatives in a safe, on Bonny Island. At present, the facility has six
profitable and responsible manner, he said. production trains capable of turning out a total
“As we flag off the Train 7 project today, I look of 22.5 mn tpy. However, capacity is set to rise to
forward to the development and execution of 30mn tpy as a result of the Train 7 project, which
more gas projects by the IOCs and indigenous envisions the construction of a seventh produc-
operators, and more trains from Nigeria LNG,” tion train that will be able to produce 4.2mn tpy,
he commented. as well as the debottlenecking of existing trains
Buhari also stressed that NLNG’s expansion to add another 3.4mn tpy of capacity. ™

Artist’s rendering of Train 7 project (Image: KBR)

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