Page 8 - AfrOil Week 35 2021

AfrOil PERFORMANCE AfrOil

Train 1 and Train 2 at Nigeria LNG’s plant on Bonny Island (Photo: AGOCO)

AGOCO may have to stop production

because of inadequate funding

LIBYA ARABIAN Gulf Oil Co. (AGOCO), a sub- Libya’s unity government has not released the
sidiary of Libya’s National Oil Corp. (NOC), money allocated to AGOCO in either the 2020
has revealed that it may halt production soon budget or in the 2021 budget, it added.
because it does not have enough money to sus- According to the Libyan press, the NOC
tain its operations. affiliate has been caught up in a dispute between
In a statement dated August 27, AGOCO Libya’s Parliament and GNU, which is headed
explained that it was facing financial strains by Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Mohammed
because it had not been able to secure adequate Dbeibah. Legislators have complained that the
funding from Libya’s interim government, 2021 budget submitted by Dbeibah’s adminis-
known as the Government of National Unity tration is both inadequate and lacking in detail.
(GNU). “The company will not be able to con- This is not the first time AGOCO has com-
tinue working without the budgets and funds to plained about a lack of funding. The company
operate and will be forced to suspend all activi- suspended production in mid-April of this year,
ties and businesses unless it is provided with the saying it had not received any budgetary alloca-
funds needed to operate production [facilities],” tion since September 2020.
it said. AGOCO operates eight oilfields in eastern
The NOC subsidiary went on to say that it Libya. Its sites are capable of turning out up to
had accumulated a significant amount of debt 280,000 barrels per day of oil and account for
while waiting for financial support from Trip- much of the crude exported via the 250,000 bpd
oli. Without government funding, AGOCO has Mersa el-Hariga terminal on the Mediterranean
not been able to obtain “necessary spare parts, coast. If the company suspends production, Lib-
equipment, operating and production require- yan crude yields, which currently stand at about
ments to continue technical or service contrac- 1.2mn bpd on average, could sink below the
tual obligations,” it reported. 1mn bpd mark. ™

NLNG seeks to refute Nigerian press

reports of disrupted gas shipments

NIGERIA THE Nigeria LNG (NLNG) consortium has dis- had continued to deliver LNG to buyers in line
missed recent reports about delayed shipments with the terms of its sales and purchase agree-
and missed deadlines, saying it remains com- ments (SPAs) and in compliance with all rele-
mitted to keeping commitments to customers. vant national and international regulations and
In a note sent to This Day, NLNG said it requirements.

P8 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 35 01•September•2021