The Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas (NLNG) Limited is making steady progress towards achieving Final Investment Decision (FID) on its Train 7 Plus (7+) project in 2018, the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Tony Attah, said yesterday at the World LNG Summit in Portugal.
This phase, on completion, will upscale NLNG’s annual production capacity from the current 22mtpa to 30mtpa capacity, a statement from the General Manager, External Relations, Kudo Eresia-Eke, noted.
Attah declared at the summit that “with Nigeria’s proven reserves of about 192 trillion cubic feet of natural gas, and another 600 trillion cubic feet in potential, this milestone development is coming at a crucial time,” adding that this was only possible with the support of the board and shareholders.
Equally propelling the company on the part of great achievements include its shared vision of helping to build a better Nigeria, core values of integrity, teamwork, respect, excellence and care, the commitment of staff, and the cooperation from government and loyal customers, among other stakeholders.
According to him, “this milestone would symbolise many things. We have consistently shown the world that NLNG is a world-class company operating out of a globally strategic country, safely and reliably delivering clean energy to its customers.
“Secondly, and most importantly for Nigeria, it shows that it is time for gas. This is the time to unleash the country’s gas potentials through catalysts like Trains 7 Plus to spur socio economic transformation.
“NLNG remains a success and we are determined to sustain our status as an inspiration to Nigeria. The company has generated $90 billion in revenue, paid $5.5 billion in taxes to the government; also helped monetise the country’s gas resources and significantly contributed to reducing gas flaring from 65 per cent to less than 20 per cent.”
NLNG runs an integrated plant on Bonny Island where its existing six liquefaction trains share common facilities, including storage tanks, shipping capacity and loading jetties, with a gas intake of 3.5 billion standard cubic feet of natural gas per day.
It has so far converted over five trillion cubic feet of associated gas, which otherwise would have been flared, to liquefied natural gas (LNG) and natural gas liquids (NGLs) for both export and domestic use. It is Nigeria’s most significant natural gas utilisation intervention to date, and is helping to preserve the environment and support Nigeria’s economic growth.
From an initial investment of about $6 billion, NLNG has grown into a $15.6 billion investment with an asset base of about $11billion.