The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), has expressed its readiness to complete ongoing gas projects aimed at linking gas-to-power and gas-to-industries to boost the national economy.
Making a presentation during the Senate Committee on Gas oversight visit to the NNPC Towers in Abuja, the Group General Manager, Gas Infrastructure Development (GID), Engr. Farouk Said, said the Corporation is currently working on six priority gas projects that would reposition the country for profitability.
Said explained that the current gas infrastructure projects being executed are in tandem with the Gas Master Plan which was approved by the last Federal Executive Council adding that the plan would have a spin off effect on the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the country.
A statement by the Corporation’s Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division, Mr. Ohi Alegbe, yesterday, quoted Said as saying: “In line with the mandate of GID, we are currently executing six critical gas infrastructure projects. Four of them are pipeline projects; the others are the Gas Revolution Industrial Park (GRIP) and the Western and Central Processing Plants.”
He said the Escravos Lagos Pipeline System II (ELPS) is a 36 inch diameter and 342 kilometer pipeline which traverses Delta, Edo, Ondo, Ogun and Lagos states stressing that the project is expected to be commissioned in the second quarter of this year.
Said noted that on completion, the ELPS II would double the capacity of existing ELPS which currently supplies 1.1 trillion standard cubic feet of gas per day noting that the pipeline would serve as a back bone of power supply as most of the power plants are located along the ELPS axis.
On the GRIP, Engr. Said said: “We have completed concept master plan; we have also done ground breaking ceremony. We have cleared 535 hectares of the land out of the 585 hectares earmarked for GRIP. Nigeria Export Processing Zone Authority (NEPZA) has also appointed a developer and an alignment meeting has been scheduled for the end of this month where all the stakeholders would get together including the investor to factor the way forward for the project.”