According to Daily Trust, for the past eight months, the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited and its upstream industry partners have failed to meet the 1.5 million oil production limit granted to the nation by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC).
Last year, Senator Heineken Lokpobiri, the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources (Oil), declared that the nation would seek increased oil production at the OPEC meeting in November.His statement came after the nation produced more than 1.5 million barrels of oil in June and July.
The existing quota, set at around 1.5 million barrels per day, no longer represents its actual production capability, according to Lokpobiri.
In June and July, the nation’s production reached 1.51 mbpd, but in the months that followed, it once more fell short of the criterion.August saw a decline to 1.43 mbpd, September saw a further decline to 1.39 mbpd, October saw a rise to 1.40 mbpd, and November saw 1.44 mbpd.
Additionally, it decreased to 1.42 mbpd in December before rising to 1.46 mbpd in January, then decreased to 1.31 mbpd in February before marginally rising to 1.38 mbpd in March.Why production is unreliable – NNPC
But the NNPC in its monthly reports offered explanations for the decline in production.
It stated in November that planned maintenance operations on important assets (Esso-Erha, Stardeep-Agbami, and Renaissance-Estuary Area) were primarily to blame for the decline.
Although it acknowledged ongoing delays with WAEP first oil, it stated that production will resume by the end of December 2025 and sought to finish all scheduled facilities turnaround maintenance (TAM) and production initiatives from JV, PSC, and NEPL assets in order to be ready to deliver the 2026 production plan.However, it claimed in December that a decrease in production was caused by unexpected unforeseen production interruptions and scheduled maintenance at the Stardeep-Agbami and Renaissance-Estuary facilities.
Although the completion of Turn Around Maintenance at Agbami and Renaissance (Estuary Area – EA) led to an increase in production, according to its January report, scheduled deliveries for January were lowered owing to inclement weather, evacuation, and asset integrity issues.
Reports for February and March have not yet been released by the company.Prof. Dayo Ayoade, an expert in energy law at the University of Lagos, told Daily Trust that operational problems in the industry still need to be resolved before output can rise. He claimed that manufacturing is still hampered by operational and technical issues like output loss and protests. “Despite all the news, we still have a lot of issues in this sector. More importantly, over the long term, many of the onshore pipelines and infrastructure that we have been using have not been replaced or updated because the IOCs have, of course, divested and left the place. We have not conquered crude oil theft and infrastructure. “So, who is in charge of this and how much money have they really invested to make sure the infrastructure functions properly?”He called the current administration’s objective of raising production to 3 million barrels by 2030 “ambitious,” saying that while it is feasible, it will be extremely challenging.
However, controlling crude oil theft and operating losses will be necessary, which is something we have not been able to do in the past. Thus, the same issue keeps coming up.The terms have not yet been made public, but it’s interesting that another settlement agreement that occurred under President Jonathan resulted in multiple international courts and arbitration disputes, so we have to wait and see, but it’s a very ambitious number. The president recently announced the resolution of the OML245 dispute, so that this would allow the beginning of investment to get the oil out of the ground,” he continued.
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