(3 minutes read)
- The stakeholders of Nigerian gas has expressed their concern over the fiscal policies governing the LNG in Nigeria
- They felt that fiscal regime might stall the realization of projects capable of meeting 40 per cent of the incremental domestic gas requirement
- Gas projects couldn’t be handled in the usual manner due to the domestic demand. There is the need to attract investors for its development.
- The Managing Director, Nigeria LNG Limited, Dr. Philip Mshelbila, emphasized the need for identifying 10 projects, which can deliver 40 per cent of the incremental gas requirement Nigeria needs
The stakeholders of Nigerian gas has expressed their concern over the fiscal policies governing the LNG in Nigeria. They felt that fiscal regime might stall the realization of projects capable of meeting 40 per cent of the incremental domestic gas requirement. Gas projects couldn’t be handled in the usual manner due to the domestic demand. There is the need to attract investors for its development.
The Managing Director, Nigeria LNG Limited, Dr. Philip Mshelbila, emphasized the need for identifying 10 projects, which can deliver 40 per cent of the incremental gas requirement Nigeria needs. He was speaking at the Nigerian Gas Association (NGA) 2021 business forum recently. The project has to focus on pricing and infrastructure that need to be created to motivate people to go for gas exploration and subsequent mining.
Despite the focus on private investment, the reality is that there was a flight of investors, specifically international oil companies (IOCs) from the upstream industry. The nation has to introspect on the reasons for the foreign investors leaving the country dismantling their investments.
The Commission Chief Executive, Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), Gbenga Komolafe, said with the enactment of the PIA, the legal, regulatory, fiscal, governance and institutional frameworks to enable the attainment of the key imperatives of government for the Nigerian oil and gas sector have been in place. The administrative provisions of Petroleum Exploration Licences (PEL), Petroleum Prospecting Licences (PPL), and Petroleum Mining Leases (PML), which replace the erstwhile OEL, OPL and OML arrangements, clearly suggest that gas exploitation will no longer be subservient to oil, as natural gas is to be explored and developed as a resource in its own right. But for tapping the vast gas resources, there should be a collaborative approach between private sector and the government.
Speaking at the occasion, Group Managing Director Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) Limited, Mele Kyari, said the PIA was essentially a gas bill. He stressed that Nigeria has always been on the liquids which took away the nation’s focus from the opportunities in the gas sector.There is an infrastructure fund established in the bill which is essentially to ensure that infrastructure in the gas sector is put in place, saying that without adequate infrastructure, there is little the sector would achieve.
