About 18 of the oil fields under 30 oil mining leases, OMLs awarded to indigenous companies as marginal fields are now at the risk of being revoked, as the deadline for the development of the fields expired March end.
Only nine of these fields have so far been developed and producing in the over 12 years of their awards, and account for just 2.1 per cent of the country's total daily crude production.
Under the Petroleum (Amendment) Act No. 23 of 1996, the President has the power to declare a field as a marginal field. This power applies where a discovery has been made but the field has been unattended after 10 years of discovery.
Licences to be revoked
Companies and their fields facing such a risk, based on the list posted on the Department of Petroleum Resources, DPR's official website, https://dpr.gov.ng/index/maps/marginal-charts/list-of-marginal-fields/ include:
Prime Energy Ltd/Suffolk Petroleum Ltd - Asaramatoru - OML 11
Bayelsa Oil & Gas - Atala - OML 46
Excel Exploration & Production - Eremor - OML 46
Independent Eneergy - Ofa - OML 30
Millennium Oil & Gas Company - Oza - OML 11
Network E & P - Qua Iboe - OML 11
Universal Energy Resources Ltd. - Stubb Creek - OML 14
Associated Oil & Gas Services Ltd/Dansaki Petroleum Ltd - Tom Shot Bank - OML 14
Sahara Energy Ltd/African Oil & Gas Ltd - Tsekelewu - OML 40
Guarantee Petroleum/Owena Oil & Gas - Ororo - OML 95
Sogenal Ltd - Akepo - OML 90
Bicta Energy System - Ogedeh - OML 90
Eurafric Energy - Dawes Island - OML 54
Del Sigma Ltd - Ke - OML 54
Goland Petroleum - Oriri - OML 88
Movido E & P - Ekeh - OML 88
Chorus Energy - Amoji - OML 56
Niger Delta Petroleum Ltd - Omerelu - OML 54
Last year, the Director, DPR, Mr. George Osahon, had warned marginal field operators, MFOs in Nigeria that marginal fields awarded in 2003 which have become none-performing after 10 years will be revoked in March 2015.
It is not clear why government granted the additional grace of two years, seeing as oil and gas licences elapse after 10 years if undeveloped, and are thrown back into the basket for future licensing rounds.
Impact of elections
Days after the expiration of the deadline, industry regulator, DPR, is yet to say anything concerning the licences revocation, a development analysts attributed to the Presidential election, which held on March 28.
In fact, the agency told Sweetcrude that, "It will not be expedient in the light of the political situation to talk about licence revocation," especially now, that a new party has been elected into power, which has promised sweeping changes in the petroleum industry.
At the outset, 24 marginal fields licences were awarded to 31 companies in the 2003 rounds, 17 of these were awarded to sole operators and seven to joint-venture operators.
But Osahon disclosed that of the 30 licences, five of them were awarded under controversial discretionary basis, of which only Oriental Energy, owner of two fields - Okwok and Ebok fields; and Niger Delta Petroleum Development Company, owner of Ogbelle field are involved in active production.
He also explained that Okwok and Ebok fields were awarded to Oriental Energy to compensate the company for losing part of its OML 115 to Equatorial Guinea due to boundary adjustment.
He said further that Niger Delta Development got the Ogbelle field in 2010, while Otakikpo and Ubima fields were recently awarded to Green Energy Limited and Allgrace Energy Limited respectively based on their commitments to fund three pilot projects, using the Public Private Partnership mechanism.
Productive fields
The DPR listed the active and productive marginal fields as follows:
Platform Petroleum
- Egbaoma - OML 38
Walter Smith and Morris Petroleum - Ibigwe
- OML 16
Frontier Oil Ltd
- Uquo - OML 13
Britania-U Nig. Ltd.
- Ajapa - OML 90
Midwestern Oil & Gas/Suntrust Oil Ltd
- Umusadege - OML 56
Pillar Oil Ltd - Umusati - OML 56.
Energia Ltd/Unipetrol Petroleum Lts (bought over by Oando)
- Ebendo - OML 56
Oriental Energy
- Ebok - OML 67
Niger Delta Petroleum Ltd - Ogbelle
- OML 54
According to the regulator, these nine productive fields had grown their reserves from 141 million barrels in 2004, to 302.6 million barrels in 2013.
Adv