‘Bonga Produced 763 Million Barrels of Oil in 12 Years’

• ‘Bonga Produced 763 Million Barrels of Oil in 12 Years’

Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company on Sunday said it had delivered a total of 763 million barrels of oil from the Bonga field between first production in 2005 and 2017.

SNEPCo, according to a statement, is also expanding the field with further drilling of wells in Bonga phases 2 and 3 and through a subsea tie-back that unlocked the nearby Bonga North West field in August 2014.

“The success story at Bonga is not only that it is Nigeria’s first oil and gas production project in more than 1,000 metres of water, or that it increased Nigeria’s oil production capacity by 10 per cent in 2005,” said the Managing Director, SNEPCo, Bayo Ojulari, while reviewing the operations of the company to journalists in Lagos.

“The main point is that Bonga is a Nigerian venture delivered by Nigerians, using global expertise and processes offered by Shell that have launched Nigeria into the league of notable deep-water players,” he added.

Ojulari described the Bonga turnaround maintenance in March and April 2017 as a significant milestone in SNEPCo’s operations.

According to the statement, it was the most complex and largest turnaround maintenance in the 12-year history of Bonga, and has helped to ensure safe and sustained production and reduced unscheduled production deferments.

The company said more than 1,000 people and 50 Nigerian contractor and sub-contractor companies participated in the exercise.

It stated that another milestone was the refurbishment of five subsea trees in 2015 at a fabrication yard at Onne in Rivers State, which it described as the first in sub-Saharan Africa, with Nigerian engineers and technicians playing key roles.

The company said working in close collaboration with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, the concessionaire and co-venture partners, it had implemented “a robust social investment portfolio that has made visible impact in the six geopolitical zones of Nigeria.”

Ojulari commended the staff and contractor personnel, who had worked hard to ensure sustained production at Bonga, thereby creating a stable source of revenue for all stakeholders, particularly the Nigerian government.

He stated, “We are working hard to strengthen the Nigerian connection. It is not a coincidence that since 2005, the managing director of SNEPCo has been Nigerian and today, 96 per cent of SNEPCo’s staff is Nigerian.

“SNEPCo is also committed to further unlocking Nigeria’s deep-water resources and along with its co-venture and government partners is evaluating opportunities to further increase production of the Bonga field in an efficient and cost-effective way.”