Managing Director of Total Energies, Nigeria, Mr Mike Sangster, has stated that some of the company’s major operations now incorporate almost 100 per cent local Nigerian content.
Sangster, while speaking on a panel session at the just concluded Nigeria International Petroleum Summit (NIPS) in Abuja, noted that there has been a huge growth in that direction in the last few years, adding that the next step should be its sustainability.
“Because the spotlight is always on the industry, you know big oil doesn’t have a good reputation anywhere, that’s an easy target to the press all over the world. So, I think for us, for me, one of the aspects of sustainability is local content.
“The industry, I think, has been proactive in developing local content. If you look at some of the things that our company has done, at very high levels, it’s almost 100 per cent of local content.
“There has been a big growth in local content. it’s important it continues. I think it’s important to see an active service sector, to grow the capabilities which is good for the country,” he said.
While noting that a huge portion of the Egina project was executed in-country, Sangster explained that public opinion is now in the direction of renewables, saying that as an industry, the operators in the oil and gas business must demonstrate responsibility and transparency.
However, he said it was disappointing to see that there’s only 10 per cent utilisation of some facilities in the country, noting that it’s important for the industry to have a regional approach to be able to deliver to other markets.
On a separate panel with the theme: “New Strategies for the New Era,” the Deputy Managing Director, Deep Water, Total, Mr Victor Bandele, stated that Nigeria has not fully taken advantage of its oil and gas facilities.
Bandele noted that even within Africa, collaboration has been quite rare, explaining that the joint use of oil and gas facilities will help drive down costs in the industry.
“Look at our onshore assets and look at the way the blocks are allocated. I look at the infrastructure that we’re putting in place and you ask whether collectively as a country, we have taken the full benefit of this footprint. The big answer is no.
“Collaboration for me is talking to one another, asking what I can get from you and what you can get from me in process facilities and tie backs. All the fields that we have might be very close to SPDC on a field that I want to develop.
“It might be better for me to tie to SPDC rather than tie to myself. And these are the opportunities that I see, going forward, that we need to capitalise on. If we do this, we will have lots of opportunities like this. There’s a lot of collaboration, lots of discussion around the best methods to tie new small fields to existing infrastructure.
“ I think this is one area that we need to really push, especially with the new licences that will be awarded to the marginal field operators,” he noted.
On the African business landscape, he described as shameful, a situation where even within the continent, it’s very difficult to sell or to import things that are wasting in one African country to another.
Source: Thisday
