Komolafe reveals new strategy to curb oil theft
Sopuruchi Onwuka
The Commission Chief Executive (CCE) of the Nigeria Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC), Engr Gbenga Komolafe, has declared that the successes recorded in combating crude oil losses in the country was the result of presidential directive on agencies to deploy kinetic and non-kinetic approaches in confronting the problem.
The CCE who spoke in a television interview weekend emphasized the importance of protecting the integrity of Nigeria’s oil and gas sector with positive narratives in order to attract potential investors.
He said President Tinubu’s directives to security agencies and the Commission had reduced crude oil losses by about 90% between 2021 – when the Commission was established – and 2025.
He explained that a set of kinetic and non-kinetic measures had been adopted to curb the menace of oil theft.
For the non-kinetic method, he stated that the Commission had introduced two regulations designed to complement the efforts of the general security.
“These are the upstream measurement regulation and the advanced cargo declaration regulation,” the NUPRC boss stated.
The CCE described the regulations as pioneering initiatives in Nigeria’s over 70 years of oil and gas exploration and development. He added that for the first time, Nigeria now has regulations that track every molecule of crude oil loaded from its terminals to the discharge point.
“So, the Commission has intuitively put these two regulations in place, and the regulations are designed in a way to be implemented in two phases.
“So, we have implemented the first phase and that is what we are trying to speak to, as it relates to the Federal Executive Council approval in respect of the Engineering Metering Audit,” said the CCE.
Komolafe further explained that it was long overdue to carry out an engineering integrity assessment of all the metering facilities that have been operating for decades.
In the past, Komolafe said, international oil companies were the ones informing Nigerians of the quantities of oil exported.
He noted,“So, we want to change that trajectory. In fact, our objective is to ensure that we get that done on a real-time basis. This is where we are going to against the production report.”
According to him, the first phase, which is the establishment of a statutory regulatory framework, has been achieved in accordance with the provisions of the PIA.
“The first phase is to look at carrying out the integrity of the metering devices. That exercise was conducted in almost 700 points in the upstream,” he disclosed.
On the Advanced Cargo Declaration regulation, the NUPRC boss explained that the objective is to ensure that every molecule of crude loaded from Nigeria’s terminals is tracked digitally and in real time up to the discharge point.
“We want to track every barrel of crude that is loaded in a tanker so that if a tanker loads 1 million barrels of crude, and it ends up discharging 1.2 million barrels of crude, we will instantly be able to flag it, because the system will be able to flag that the tanker is discharging above the permitted volume,” Komolafe said.
