Anyaoku leads Anambra into oil-producers’ club, 45 years after

Posers over govt’s plan to spend  $750m on planned refinery

NEARLY 45 years after Safrap, now Total Plc, first discovered and drilled oil in Aguleri, Anambra-East Council of the state, the former Secretary General of the Commonwealth, Chief Emeka Anyaoku, who is the chairman of the Orient Petroleum Resources Ltd (OPR), has led the state into the elite oil-producing states’ club.

Therefore, come August 30, 2012, President Goodluck Jonathan is expected to commission the production of oil at the 55,000bpd first wholly privately-owned Orient Petroleum Resources’ (OPR) oil rig in Aguleri.

The company, according to its Managing Director, Emeka Nwawka, is currently stockpiling the produced crude in large barges at the site ahead of its refinery, which would be commissioned in a few months.

The chief executive also confirmed that they had resolved in writing all initial disagreements over the location and area covered by their operations with the Enugu State government. He said they sorted things out with the Secretary to the State Government, Patrick Okolo and the Attorney General, Anthony Ani, as well as chairman of the Uzor Uwani Local Council.

Nwawka stated that the two oil blocs sitting on acreage of 2158km2 extends a bit into Edo, Delta and Enugu states, but that the location of the well in Anambra State was never in any form of dispute.

The Federal Government had granted two oil blocs marked as OPL 915 and 916 to the company in 2002, and after analysing the seismic data thereto, the company decided to proceed with full development. The actual drilling process, which commenced a few months ago, began with their re-entry of the OPL 915, otherwise referred to as Anambra River 1, which had first been drilled about 45 years ago in 1967 by the Safrap (which later became Elf and later again Total Plc).

The export details and processes were already being worked out with the appropriate federal agencies too.

He disclosed that already, the detailed engineering aspects of the refinery had been completed.

The managing director also confirmed that the installation of the modules was planned in phases. The phase one, with a 20,000bpd capacity, would be ready next year (2013) during which it is expected that the whole project whose journey began in 2002, would have taken more than $100 million.

The phase-two, with 35,000 bpd capacity, is expected to be ready the following year in 2014. It is, therefore, expected that when fully completed to installed output capacity of 55,000bpd in 2014, it would have taken about $200 million.

This is against the proposed six new refineries by the Federal Government that would cost Nigerian taxpayers $750 million each, with proposed installed capacity of 30,000bpd output.

According to Nwawka, the modular plan gives them confidence that with anticipated enhanced cash flow from the initial module, they would then reinvest in the extension of the increased refining capacity. It would also support other ancillary needs like the roads, tanks, workshops, electricity generation and others.

Orient Petroleum Resources, operators of the Orient Refinery and other subsidiaries, is a wholly privately-owned shareholding venture promoted in 2001. It has numerous shareholders’ base from all parts of the country, together with some councils and state governments as minority investors, including Rivers, Anambra and the 21 councils of Anambra State.

The licence to construct a refinery was granted by the Federal Government in 2002 and with due operational diligence, it secured the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) certificate in 2005. Thus, it became the first to be so certified in the country’s oil sector.

The OPR example may be the shining example the nation needs to break away from the refining and supply hiccups of the sector, which have over the years, been used to distort the budgetary plans of the various levels of government.