Now is best time to operate in Nigeria’s energy sector __Igiehon
Sopuruchi Onwuka
Managing Director of Heirs Energies Limited, Mr Osa Igiehon, has declared that the operating environment for Nigerian petroleum industry has been enhanced with policy, fiscal and regulatory instruments that support efficient processes and optimum output.
Mr Igiehon who boasts that Heirs Energies his is Africa’s brownfield champion with track record of achieving great ambitions, said that the petroleum industry has successfully walked back from dreadful security challenges, fiscal disputes and blurred policy environment. He added that the atmosphere enhances investor confidence with fiscal clarity, incentives and stable operating environment.
The new industry setting, according to him, has enabled the company revamp aged production facilities at operated oil mining lease (OML) 17 onshore Niger Delta by introducing novel operating strategies that enabled cost reduction, production boost and diversification into wider valuechain opportunities.
Mr Igiehon hosted business and energy editors in his office for briefing on the company’s vision for Nigerian and Africa energy industry. He stated that Heirs Energies is driving a comprehensive work programme to improve production dramatically in response to the government’s aspiration to boost gross national output. He said government’s supportive policies in the industry and the fiscal support hosted in the recent Presidential Orders preset a call on the industry accelerate production.
Oracle Intelligence reports that the OML 17 operated by Heirs Energies is an urban oil block that sits in the center of Port Harcourt, Rivers State. The block hosts main clusters of operating facilities in Agbada and Obigbo in Port Harcourt. They include but limited to non-associated gas plants, associated gas gathering plants, flow stations and sundry production and processing facilities.
Outputs from the fields in the block flow through the Trans-Niger Pipeline (TNP) to export terminals. Until recently, the TNP was rendered inoperable in the past by thieving vandals who operated illegal export routes with crude oil stolen from oil industry facilities in the Niger Delta.
Group Chief Executive Officer of HSI Energies, Mr Chikezie Nwosu, stated in a separate media parley with the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE) that the TNP lost 95 percent flow integrity in the heights of crude oil theft in the Niger Delta, lamenting that some companies hardly recovered five percent of crude commodities that were flown through the pipeline.
He cited the high volume of crude oil stealing in the industry as the reason some indigenous companies like Aradel and Waltersmith considered investments in integrated activities that entailed additional investments in onsite modular refineries.
Mr Igeihon confirmed that Heirs Energies re-entered the OML 17 fields with only 3.0 percent recovery rate from the TNP, a frustrating situation that sparked ingenious strategies in operating vulnerable urban assets in the country.
He stated that the company’s current production recovery rate on the TNP was approximately 100 percent. He added the improved security situation in the operating environment and the fiscal incentives provided under the presidential executive orders for efficiency have laid new investment agenda for resource value optimization.
With proven reserves of 1.5 billion barrels of stock oil in place and another1.1 billion barrels of oil in probable reserves, he said, Heirs Energies would grow the core and expand portfolios. He said the company was currently building integrated energy chain that harnesses gas output from operated facilities to fire power generation in the country.
In pointing at business sustainability, Mr Igiehon stated that Heirs Energies was laying out significant investments in field life extension projects, replacement of aging facilities, drilling campaigns, and gas monetization programmes.
“No time is better than now in the petroleum industry,” Mr Igiehon declared, explaining that the combination of the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA), improved pipeline security and presidential executive orders that promote efficiency has changed the narrative of operating losses to stories of enhanced efficiency.
He said Heirs Energies is poised and positioned for growth across the full energy loop, adding that the company is thriving in spite of challenges. He stated that the operating environment currently presents more positivity that enhances onshore operations.
