An oil and gas expert, Prof. Olanrewaju Aladeitan, has commended the new oil and gas discoveries in Nigeria, which indicate that the country has huge gas reserves. He said Nigeria could be more described as a gas country than a crude oil country because it had trillions of cubic feet of gas reserves. Aladeitan, who is a professor of Energy and Natural Resources at the University of Abuja, made this known in an interview with the media on Sunday, March 19, 2023.
It had been reported earlier that President Muhammadu Buhari had in November 2022 inaugurated the Kolmani Integrated Development Project at Kolmani River II oil field located at a border community between Bauchi and Gombe States. The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Ltd. (NNPCL) in 2019 had announced the discovery of crude oil, gas and condensate in the Kolmani Oil Field with over one billion oil barrels reserves and 500 billion cubic feet of gas. The NNPCL is also set to develop the first oil well in Nasarawa State in March 2023 in view of its confirmation of presence of substantial hydro carbon resources in the state.
There could be more gas than crude oil in Bauchi.
Prof. Aladeitan said that information from an insider revealed that data emerging from the Bauchi-Gombe axis showed that there was oil in commercial quantity, but with a caveat that gas could be more. He said some of the new frontiers that were also being discovered in the country even had more gas reserves than crude oil reserves. This means Nigeria’s gas reserve is very huge. “We have a huge gas reserve there somewhere around Igbariam in Anambra,” he said.
He said that there are new frontiers coming up. Nigeria has the Bauchi-Gombe new oil and gas discovery that is fast coming recently in Nasarawa and Niger. By the time the efforts are taken to the Sokoto Trough, he said, Nigeria may also find some reserves there as well. The NNPC Limited has over the years expended funds on frontier exploration, but the spending has now been statutorily ingrained in the new Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) 2021.
Some people doubt the discovery of oil in those environments.
Speaking on the perception of some people doubted whether oil was truly found in the new locations, Prof. Aladeitan said all the troughs had initially shown evidence of crude oil and gas in the past. But unfortunately, the technology available then may not have made it possible to follow up the discoveries. He said though some people were skeptical about the discovery of oil in those environments, but it was not as if those areas never showed evidence of crude oil as there were traces.
According to him, the kind of technology that existed in the past could not make them explore further, but now there is advanced technology that has made it possible. The professor further said that then, when Shell was exploring oil in the entire country, the company realized that the Niger Delta had more concentration of oil. He said this made Shell concentrate in that region, not that there had not been traces of oil in other places.
Further discoveries cannot be predicted based on current data.
Prof. Aladeitan said that it is not sure that if the exploration continues, whether or not it will show that oil is in commercial quantity. However, he assures everyone from an insider view that the data emerging from the Bauchi-Gombe axis shows that there is oil in commercial quantity but with a caveat that what they may get, could be much more gas. He said there are even traces of it in the Chad Basin. In essence, with improved technology and improved knowledge now, experts can get clearer pictures of those things we could not assess or have information about in the past.
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