NUPRC Rallies Stakeholders, Investors For Gas Flare Elimination

The Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) has organised a Bidders’ Conference/Investors Forum for stakeholders in the sector, to fast track implementation of the Nigerian Gas Flare Commercialisation Programme (NGFCP).

NUPRC Chief executive, Mr Gbenga Komolafe, who made this known in a statement in Abuja, said the conference would offer stakeholders and investors in the country’s upstream petroleum sector the opportunity to seek clarifications on the programme.

The forum billed for Feb. 2, 2023 in Abuja would hold barely a month after a similar conference in Lagos on Jan. 16, for interested stakeholders and investors in the proposed mini bid round for deep offshore oil fields.

Komolafe said participants in the forum would include qualified applicants, financiers, technology providers, equipment manufacturers, service providers, funders, and other interested entities.

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He said it would also facilitate engagements of qualified applicants with technology providers, prospective lenders, financial institutions as well as foster business relationships and partnerships for the overall programme success.

According to Komolafe, the NUPRC in August 2022 re-launched the NGFCP 2022, to drive Nigeria’s commitment to end routine gas flaring within the decade, support the imperatives of the Nigeria Energy Transition Plan (ETP) and create value from waste.

He said the NGFCP 2022 had been restructured to reflect current gas flaring situation, prevailing operational realities in the industry, and changes in the socio-economic landscape due to the passage of time since the NGFCP was originally conceived in alignment with the Petroleum Industry Act 2021 (PIA).

“The NGFCP 2022 is therefore modified to deliver end-to-end value from flare gas commercialisation to both existing and new participants.

“In accordance with Section 105 (2) of the PIA and similar provisions enabling the Commission in that respect, the Commission commenced the Request for Qualification (RFQ) stage of the NGFCP 2022.

“This was through the issuance of Statement of Qualification (SOQ) to enable existing applicants to validate their status and for new investors to register to participate through the NGFCP website/ portal.

“The NGFCP 2022 recorded significant interest from stakeholders including existing participants, new investors, multi-lateral institutions, equipment manufacturers and the wider investment communities, both domestic and international.

“As at the SOQ submission deadline, 300 companies/entities had registered their interest to either revalidate their prequalification status as existing participants or submit Statement of Qualification (SOQ) as new participants.

“Also, in line with the provisions of the RFQ, the SOQ evaluation exercise was conducted by the Commission where in a total of 139 applicants were deemed successful and awarded the Qualified Applicant status,” he said.

To that end, and in reliance on Section 105 (2) of the PIA and similar provisions enabling the Commission in that respect, he said the Commission had published the list of qualified applicants who will proceed to the Request for Proposal (RFP) phase of the NGFCP 2022.

He further said details of the SOQ evaluation exercise could be accessed on the NUPRC website and NGFCP portal via www.nuprc.gov.ng and ngfcp.nuprc.gov.ng, respectively.