Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) Mr Mele Kyari, has indicated plans to harness gas stranded in the Deepwater for utilisation by the Nigerian-Morocco gas pipeline project.
He said the project would also substantially help improve gas supply to the domestic market as well as improve power supply.
“We have a lot of stranded gas particularly in the Deepwater that we need to put on the table. This project will enable us have more gas for domestic consumption so that we can improve power supply and gas to Industry,” Kyari stated.
Kyari who was speaking in Abuja at a stakeholders’ engagement involving the corporation, its Moroccan partner on the gas project, the Morocco National Office for Hydrocarbons & Mines (ONHYM), and the executives of International Oil Companies operating Nigeria, emphasised that the Nigeria-Morocco Gas Pipeline (NMGP) project would open new vistas for Nigeria’s gas aspirations.
The meeting was sequel to high-level discussions on the Pipeline Cooperation Agreement (PCA) for the NMGP project signed between both countries’ leaders – Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari and King Hassan VI of Morocco.
The PCA will particularly facilitate the establishment of a gas pipeline to supply the product from Nigeria to Morocco and the West African sub-region and further into Europe.
At the moment, both countries are planning to extend the pipeline that has been pumping gas from Nigeria to Benin, Togo and Ghana since 2010 to Morocco.
Kyari explained that along the pipeline’s corridor all the way to Morocco and into Europe, there was a huge potential for development of the West African sub-Continent and part of North Africa.
“By doing this, we are also growing the economies of these countries along this pipeline and eventually ensuring peace and security which are necessary for the economic growth of these countries,” he added.
Kyari, who restated government’s commitment to the project, also reassured the IOCs that issues around fiscal terms were being handled, urging them to identify with the project.
In her remarks, the Director General of the ONHYM, Amina Benkhadra, assured NNPC of the Moroccan government’s total support towards the project, stressing that the IOCs needed to be brought to speed on it.