Nigeria increases oil production by 28,000 bpd with new Utapate crude
By Adewale Sanyaolu
The NNPC Ltd yesterday announced the introduction of Utapate crude oil blend, a new crude oil grade into the international crude oil market.
Located offshore Akwa Ibom State in Nigeria, Utapate’s current crude oil production is at 28,000 barrels per day, with potentials to increase it to 50,000 barrels per day. Also, the sulphur content of the new crude is 0.0655 per cent
Similar to the Nembe crude oil grade, the Utapate crude oil blend has a low sulphur content and low carbon footprint due to flare gas elimination, fitting perfectly into the required spec of major buyers in Europe.
The crude oil grade From Oil Mining Lease (OML) 13, fully operated by NEPL, NNPC Ltd’s upstream subsidiary, commenced operations in July 2024, as its first cargo headed for Spain.
Spanish oil giant Repsol, won the tender for the initial cargo of 950,000 barrels of the new crude blend which is comparable to the much sought after Amenam crude. Gulf Transport and Trading, another leading crude oil dealer, have also secured the cargoes’ tenders for August and September 2024.
During the Argus European Crude Conference in London last year, NNPC Ltd announced the launch of Nembe crude oil, produced by the NNPC/Aiteo operated Oil Mining Lease (OML) 29 Joint Venture (JV).
This remarkable achievement signals the commitment of the NNPC Ltd to increase Nigeria’s crude oil production and grow reserves through the development of new assets.
The addition of the new crude oil grade in addition to others at the market comes at a time the country is making efforts to grow its oil production to two million barrels per day in a bid to shore up revenue.
The Chief Executive of the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission, Gbenga Komolafe, had recently disclosed that the country’s average daily production stood at 1.61 million barrels per day as of July 23.
Komolafe revealed that at the House of Representatives Special Committee’s two-day public/investigative hearing on oil theft/losses.
“As of July 23, 2024, Nigeria’s average daily production stands at 1.61mbpd,” he disclosed.
This is coming barely two weeks after the commission announced that the average daily oil production for June was 1.25mbpd.
According to Komolafe, Nigeria had continued to dominate as Africa’s largest producer of crude oil, boasting proven reserves of 37.50 billion barrels and a production capacity of approximately 2.19mbpd.
On the statutory mandates and regulatory strategies of the NUPRC, he said the Petroleum Industry Act 2021 grants the commission several statutory mandates in the areas of calibration and certification of metering systems and equipment, publication of reports and statistics on upstream operations, regulatory oversight and issuance of quality and quantity certificates for exports, and determination of fiscal prices for crude oil and condensate.
Komolafe added that the strategies of the commission aimed to optimise production, enhance regulatory oversight, and ensure accurate measurement and accounting.
He maintained that the NUPRC had prioritised improving rig availability and reducing non-productive time through unlocking heavy crude oil reserves via industry workshops.
Those initiatives, he noted, also supported new Petroleum Prospecting License awardees to achieve their first oil, among other initiatives.
