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Yesterday, President Muhammadu Buhari commissioned Africa’s largest granulated urea plant and the second biggest in the world in Ibeju Lekki. The Dangote Fertilizer facility has a capacity of 3 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) and is now making Nigeria self-sufficient in fertilizers, with extra capacity reserved for exports. “We have already started exporting to the USA, Brazil, India and Mexico,” Aliko Dangote said during the commissioning ceremony held at the Lekki Free Zone. The $2.5bn twin train facility processes domestic gas to produce urea and ammonia, and is located next to the 650,000 bpd Dangote refinery and petrochemicals complex, where operations are yet to start. Just this month, state-owned NNPC, the Shell Petroleum Development Co. (SPDC) JV and Dangote sealed a new Gas Supply & Aggregation Agreement (GSAA) to supply 70 MMscfd of gas from the Tunu CPF (OML 35) to Dangote Fertilizer. Another GSAA had previously been signed in December 2019 with Chevron Nigeria.
On Sunday, Italian major Eni and national oil company Sonatrach have announced a new significant onshore oil and associated gas discovery in their Zemlet el Arbi concession within the HDLE prospect. This is the first of five exploratory wells planned in the Berjine North Basin in the Algerian desert. The concession is operated by their joint-venture, with Sonatrach holding 51% and Eni the remaining 49%. “Preliminary estimates of the size of the discovery are around 140 million barrels of oil in place,” Eni said in a statement. Both company have already declared that they would fast-track the field’s development for a start-up in Q3 2022. The HDLE-1 discovery is located about 15km from the Bir Rebaa North field processing facilities. The well discovered light oil in the Triassic sandstones of Tagi Formation, confirming 26 m of net pay with excellent petrophysical characteristics. Its production test delivered 7,000 barrels of oil per day (bopd) and 5 MMscfd of gas. “The discovery will be quickly appraised with the drilling of a second well, HDLE-2, in April 2022 to confirm the additional potential of the structure extending in the adjacent Sif Fatima 2 concession operated by an Eni-Sonatrach JV (50-50%),” Eni added.