The Group Managing Director of Eterna Plc, Dr. Gabriel Ogbechie, has highlighted that raising Nigeria’s crude oil output is a way to address the country’s current economic problems.
According to The PUNCH, he said these during a roundtable discussion at the 29th Edition National Economic Summit in Abuja.
The discussion, under the title “Igniting Growth: Energy and Nigeria’s Global Race,” concentrated on modernizing the energy industry to increase output, lower operating costs, improve international trade, and strengthen the national economy.
Ogbechie, who was speaking on the panel, stated that almost 95% of Nigeria’s foreign profits come from its enormous oil reserves. However, the country’s production remains inadequate, which has caused a negative impact on the country’s economy.
According to Ogbechie, Nigeria should use its gas resources to meet its domestic LPG needs rather than importing LPG as it is a gas-producing country.
There has been a lot of back and forth between fossil fuel and renewable energy, but Nigeria is still mostly a fossil fuel-based country, the speaker noted.
“We need to do a lot to ramp up production since Nigeria has proven oil reserves of about 36 billion barrels, but our current production is only 1.4 billion barrels per day at best.
“Since the production of crude oil and other fossil fuels accounts for more than 95% of Nigeria’s foreign exchange revenues, I firmly believe that the country should be able to produce roughly 3 million barrels of crude oil per day at the very least.”
He said, “We have over 208 trillion cubic feet of known gas reserves; sadly, a large portion of this gas gets flared.
“The fines that oil-producing corporations pay for flaring gas in the field are insufficient to prevent them from flaring this gas; rather, it’s more like a slap on the wrist.
“But it is shameful that we continue to import LPG into our country and sell it for so little foreign currency. Nigeria shouldn’t be importing LPG; we should be able to meet our own needs for LPG.”
According to Ogbechie, Eternal Plc is expanding its ability to take on more duties in the energy sector and is making its fair share of contributions to assist the industry’s growth. He urged the government to keep funding the energy industry.
He urged the government to maintain its policy of policy support for the energy industry.
Among the other members of the panel are the Executive Secretary of NCDMB, Mr. SIMBI Wabote, and the Minister of State for Oil, Senator Heineken Lokpobiri.
