Africa’s top oil producer, Nigeria, is seeking a production target under the OPEC+ agreement of 2 million barrels per day (bpd) for 2027, up from the current quota of 1.5 million bpd, Bashir Ojulari, chief executive of state-held oil firm NNPC, has told Argus.
Nigeria has been pumping oil below its output quota for years, but has recently ramped up production, which now stands at about 1.4 million bpd, per Ojulari’s estimates.
OPEC+ delegates have started talks about establishing the baselines for individual members’ production quotas for 2027.
Nigeria will seek production capacity of 2.4 million bpd and a production target of 2 million bpd, including 1.7 million bpd of crude oil and 300,000 bpd of condensate output, Ojulari said.
Earlier this year, Nigeria’s government urged the oil companies operating in the country to collaborate to increase oil output in the producer that hasn’t been able to pump to its OPEC quota for years.
Oil theft and pipeline vandalism have long plagued Nigeria’s upstream oil and gas industry, driving majors out of the biggest OPEC producer in Africa and often resulting in force majeure at the key crude oil export terminals.
Nigerian authorities have been clamping down on oil theft and have been supportive of an increase in oil and gas output in recent months.
Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) has said that U.S. supermajor ExxonMobil plans to invest as much as $1.5 billion in deepwater oil and gas exploration and development offshore Nigeria.
Moreover, supermajors Shell and TotalEnergies expect to raise oil and gas production over the next two years from projects they operate in Nigeria.
Shell sees the start-up of the Bonga North deepwater oil and gas field by 2027, while TotalEnergies expects the Ubeta gas field to also begin production by that year, the top executives of the Nigerian units of the supermajor told an energy conference in Nigeria last week.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
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