The planned surge will partly come from oil condensate, a lighter more volatile hydrocarbon, rather than just crude, so that Nigeria can largely keep within its OPEC+ quota of 1.5 million barrels of crude, according to Olu Verheijen, special adviser on energy to President Bola Tinubu. Improvements in security around oil production and transportation sites is the main driver behind the rising production, she added.
“The OPEC quota does not include condensate. The target we’ve set for ourselves is a combination of condensate and crude,” she said in an interview at an energy conference in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania last week, “The idea is to try and demonstrate the capacity for a higher quota as required.”
Nigeria’s rising production, from as low as 1.1 million barrels per day in 2022, comes as the country tries to bolster income to deal with a myriad of economic challenges ranging from widespread poverty to dilapidated infrastructure. In December it produced 1.67 million barrels, of which 1.48 million barrels were crude.
Net Exporter
The West African nation is also on course to become a net exporter of oil products as a refinery owned by billionaire Aliko Dangote ramps up production, Verheijen said.
“It’s an ambitious push,” she said. “But it’s one to aim for.”
The removal of fuel subsidies could also foster further investment in refineries, she said.
“What that has done is allowed the downstream, mainstream downstream of that sector to now become commercially viable for the first time in decades,” she said. “Investments in refineries now make sense when they didn’t before.”
(bloomberg.com, February 3, 2025)