Page 10 - AfrElec Week 28

AfrElec GAS-FIRED GENERATION AfrElec
NNPC says Nigerian gas output rose 3.73% in April
NIGERIA
NIGERIA saw natural gas production levels rise slightly in April, according to the monthly nan- cial and operations report published by Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. (NNPC) last week.
In the report, Kennie Obateru, the head of the company’s public a airs division, noted that the West African state had extracted 226.51bn cubic feet (6.414bn cubic metres) of gas, or 7.786 bcf (220.487mn cubic metres) per day, in April. is represents a 3.73% month-on-month increase on the March gure, he said.
Fields developed by joint ventures accounted for 69.57% of total production, while fields developed under production-sharing contracts (PSCs) comprised another 21.46%, he added. e remaining 8.97% came from Nigerian Petro- leum Development Co. (NPDC), he stated.
Obateru further noted that Nigeria had com- mercialised 136.44 bcf (3.863 bcm), or 48.88 bcf (1.384 bcm) per day, of gas in April. Some 99.45 bcf (2.816 bcm), or 3.32 bcf (94.2 mcm) per day, of gas was exported, he stated, while another
36.99 bcf (1.048 bcm), or 1.23 bcf (34.83 mcm) per day, went to the domestic market.
The majority of domestic gas deliveries – 23.361 bcf (661.545 mcm), or 787.7mn cubic feet (22.306 mcm) per day, equivalent to 63.88% of the total – went to thermal power plants (TPPs), he added. is was enough to sustain 2,873 MW of generating capacity, he said.
e remaining domestic volumes – 13.629 bcf (385.951 mcm), or 445.31 mmcf (12.61 mcm) per day – went to industrial customers, he stated. He did not provide comparative data from March for exports or domestic deliveries.
Nigeria’s government has declared 2020 to be the “Year of Gas” in a bid to promote the use of the country’s abundant natural and associated gas resources. is programme builds on previ- ous e orts to encourage domestic gas consump- tion, such as the campaign that made gas into the primary fuel for TPPs that accounted for 80% of Nigeria’s electricity production in 2019.™
Golar LNG’s FLNG vessel loads 40th cargo offshore Cameroon
CAMEROON
BERMUDA-BASED Golar LNG has reported that the Hilli Episeyo, the rst vessel in the world to be converted to a oating LNG (FLNG) unit, has reached the milestone of li ing its 40th cargo o shore Cameroon.
According to the company, the FLNG n- ished loading its latest cargo on June 18. e shipment went to Russia’s Gazprom, which is the off-taker of LNG from the facility under an eight-year agreement that is due to expire in 2026.
e Hilli Episeyo was converted to liquefy gas from the Sanaga eld, which is being developed by Perenco (UK/France) and Société Nation- ale des Hydrocarbures (SNH), the national oil company (NOC) of Cameroon. e partners send gas from the eld to an onshore treatment facility for processing before delivering it to the FLNG unit.
The vessel began producing LNG in May 2018 and has been turning out 1.2mn tonnes per year (tpy) from one of its two production trains. To date, it has maintained 100% up-time and
has produced more than 2.5mn tonnes of LNG. It has loaded 11 of its 40 cargoes onto tankers owned by Golar LNG – namely, the Golar Maria, the Golar Viking and the Nanook.
e vessel could eventually see output double to 2.4mn tpy, as Golar LNG has held talks with Perenco and SNH on the possibility of activating the Hilli Episeyo’s second production train. is is not likely to happen in the near future, though, as the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has reduced global fuel demand.
e FLNG is operating under a tolling agree- ment. It generates about $40mn per quarter in tolling revenues, with Golar LNG receiving 50% of the total and its NASDAQ-listed a liate Golar LNG Partners receiving the other 50%, in line with the terms of a drop-down deal nalised in 2018.
e Hilli Episeyo began its life as one of Golar LNG’s 125,000-cubic metre tankers. It was con- verted to an FLNG unit at the Keppel shipyards in Singapore at a cost of $1.2bn.™
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w w w . N E W S B A S E . c o m Week 28 16•July•2020