Nigeria loses N59.6bn to pipeline vandalism — NNPC

The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, has revealed that the country has lost crude oil and other petroleum products valued at N59.597 billion to pipeline vandalism in 2014.

This was disclosed in the corporation’s Annual Statistical Bulletin for 2014 released yesterday.

According to the report, pipeline vandalism increased by 4.54 per cent compared to the situation in 2013.355,690 metric tonnes of petroleum products valued at N44.75 billion was lost in the period under review.

It also stated that in addition  1.08 million barrels of crude oil valued at about N14.847 billion.

“A total of 3,732 line breaks were reported on NNPC pipelines out of which 3,700 were as a result of vandalism, while 32 cases were due to system deterioration resulting in a loss of 355.69 thousand metric tonnes of petroleum products worth about N44.75 billion.

Also 1.08 million barrels of crude oil worth about N14.847 billion was lost in the same period.

There were 32 cases of fire incidents during the year under review.” it said.

Giving a breakdown of crude oil loss, the NNPC stated that the country lost 17,964 barrels of Bonny Light valued at N264.37 million, while 586,776 barrels of Escravos Light valued at N8.636 billion was lost to pipeline vandalism in the period under review.

The corporation also stated that the activities of the pipeline vandals led to the loss of 341,566 barrels of Ughelli Blend valued at N5.027 billion while 62,499 barrels of Seplat blend valued at N919 million was lost in 2014.

In the area of petroleum products loss, pipeline vandalism in the Port Harcourt network, led to the loss 7,460 metric tonnes of petroleum products valued at N958.72 million; Warri lost 14,290 metric tonnes valued at N2.312 billion, while Mosimi lost 332,850 metric tonnes valued at N41.279 billion.

It further hinted that the vandalisation of the pipeline network in Kaduna led to the loss of 1,080 metric tonnes valued at N200.39 million.

Furthermore, the NNPC disclosed that the country recorded crude oil and condensate production of 798.542 million barrels in 2014, dropping by 0.24 per cent from 2013’s production.

This, according to the NNPC, represented an average crude oil output of 2.19 million barrels per day.

In the gas sector, the NNPC noted that 28 companies produced 2.524 trillion Standard Cubic Feet (SCF) of natural gas in the period under review.

“This shows an increase of 8.56 per cent when compared with 2013 production.

Of the quantity produced, 2.233 trillion SCF, representing 88.53 per cent of total production was utilised, while 289.60 billion SCF, representing 11.47 per cent of total production was flared.”

In addition, the NNPC stated that the local refineries received a total of 25.839 million barrels (3.492 million metric tonnes) of (dry) crude oil, condensate and slops and processed 23.360 million barrels (3.157 million metric tonnes) into various petroleum products.

“The total production output by the refineries was 2.665 million metric tonnes of various petroleum products.

The combined average refining capacity utilization for year 2014 was 14.4 per cent as against 22 per cent in the previous year,” the NNPC stated.