Tapre Timine
Nigeria’s crude oil production experienced a great surge in the first four months of 2024, according to data released by the Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC).
NUPRC revealed that the country produced 159,158,191 barrels of crude oil during this period, marking a substantial increase compared to previous years.
In January, Nigeria recorded a production of 44.2 million barrels, with an average daily output of 1.42 million barrels per day (mbpd). Although February and March saw a slight decline in production, April witnessed a marginal increase to 38.4 million barrels, with daily production rising to 1.28 mbpd.
Compared to the same period in 2023, Nigeria’s total oil output increased by 14.3 million barrels in 2024. However, this figure still falls short of the robust production of 215.2 million barrels recorded in 2020.
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Mele Kyari, the Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC), highlighted the adverse effects of oil theft and vandalism on the nation’s economy.
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Kyari stressed the need to address security issues to attract investments and enhance oil production. However, he is optimistic about Nigeria’s potential to achieve a production level of 1.7 mbpd if security challenges are adequately addressed.
He added that removing security challenges in onshore assets is crucial to increasing oil production as the presence of illegal connections and refineries discourages investors from putting money into oil production.
According to him, the government’s efforts to address these issues will yield positive results, citing the removal of over 5,800 illegal connections and 6,800 illegal refineries from pipelines in the last two years.
Kyari also mentioned that Nigeria’s production capacity can increase massively without drilling new wells, citing the example of April 17, 2020, when production shot up to 2.2 mbpd due to the COVID-19 pandemic, which temporarily reduced oil theft and vandalism.
NNPCL’s Boss believed that with the current efforts to address security challenges, Nigeria is inching closer to achieving a production level of 1.7 mbpd.
