NNPC to intensify oil search in Anambra, Benin, Bida
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, yesterday, said it would reinvigorate crude oil exploration in Anambra, Benin, Bida and four other hydrocarbon basins across the country.
The other four hydrocarbon basins are Niger Delta, Chad, Sokoto and Benue Trough.
The NNPC, in a statement in Abuja, said the renewed oil and gas exploration in these basins was part of strategies to shore up the country’s crude oil and gas reserve base.
Group Managing Director of the NNPC, Mr. Maikanti Baru, who stated this when he received Governor Ibrahim Geidam of Yobe State, in Abuja, also disclosed that modalities were on to open up all the basins in the country to prospective investors.
He said: “We are on target and we are looking at the prospectivity of the whole basins of Niger Delta, Chad, Anambra, Benue Trough, Benin, Sokoto and Bida. We are focused on delivering on these basins in line with our mandate.”
Baru stated that preliminary exploratory activities had indicated some signs of hydrocarbon in eastern Yobe of the Chad Basin, adding that once the NNPC received security clearance, the 3D seismic data acquisition in the area would continue as scheduled.
Also speaking, Governor Geidam said his visit was informed by the commitment of President Muhammadu Buhari’s government to increase Nigeria’s oil reserves through exploration of oil and gas in the Chad Basin, adding that the policy direction of the Federal Government was of interest to the state because the basin covers a large area including Yobe State.
