N2.6m burnt daily through gas flaring–DPR

&NewLine;<p>Department of&NewLine;Petroleum Resources&comma; DPR&comma; on Thursday May 30 lamented the huge daily revenue&NewLine;loss of about N2&period;6 million through gas flaring in the Niger Delta and promised&NewLine;to redouble efforts at curtailing the unacceptable economic waste through&NewLine;legislation&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>This was the&NewLine;submission of Director&comma; Department of Petroleum Resources &lpar;DPR&rpar;&comma; Mr Ladan&NewLine;Modecai&comma; at the monthly Nigeria-South Africa Chamber of Commerce breakfast&NewLine;meeting&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>Modecai&comma; who was&NewLine;represented at the May breakfast edition by the Deputy Manager&comma; Gas Exploration&NewLine;and Production&comma; Mr Joseph Ogunsola&comma; sponsored by Sasol Chemicals with a theme &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Nigeria&NewLine;Gas Sector Landscape&comma; Status&comma; Potential&comma; Enablers and Opportunity&comma;” stated that&NewLine;oil and gas business will be there for a long time&comma; playing its significant&NewLine;role despite the emergence of renewable source of energy&period; He therefore&comma; urged South&NewLine;African government and other investors to invest in the Nigeria’s gas sector&comma;&NewLine;which he &nbsp&semi;said is currently worth &dollar;50&NewLine;billion&comma; about N18 trillion with a lot of opportunities&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>This admonition&NewLine;allayed the growing fears in some quarters about oil drying up&comma; adding that investment&NewLine;prospects abound in the development of upstream gas fields with a total of 37&period;4&NewLine;trillion cubic feet&comma; Trans-Nigeria gas pipeline project including a gas&NewLine;revolution industrial park at Ogidigben FTZ&comma; three power plants for additional&NewLine;3&period;2GW capacity&comma; licensing and establishment of several modular refineries&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;The National&NewLine;Gas Policy&comma; Nigerian Gas Flare Commercialisation Programme and Gas Network Code&NewLine;are key enablers in charting our path toward optimum Gas Development and&NewLine;Gas-Based Industrialisation&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Most of the erstwhile constraints are&NewLine;being addressed in a holistic manner through government policies&comma; reforms&comma; and&NewLine;gas monetisation drive&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Hitherto&comma; absence of robust&NewLine;legislative&comma; physical and commercial structures for gas and mono-product nature&NewLine;of the economy have militated against the achievement of gas utilisation’’&comma; he&NewLine;said&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>Modecai disclosed&NewLine;government’s commitment to grow reserves and eliminate flaring&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>To achieve this&comma;&NewLine;he stated that DPR is currently involved in deep drilling and marginal field&NewLine;developments adding that Nigeria currently ranks first in Africa and ninth in global&NewLine;gas capacity with a daily production of 8 billion for industrial and commercial&NewLine;use&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;