By Adedapo Adesanya
Heirs Oil & Gas Limited has pledged to boost oil production from the onshore block to 100,000 barrels per day.
Business Post had reported the acquisition of oil mining lease OML 17 from Shell last month for more than a billion dollars provided by a consortium of global and regional banks and investors comprising Union Bank, Afreximbank, ABSA, Africa Finance Corporation, Hybrid Capital, and Amundi, a global asset management company.
OML 17 has a current production capacity of 27,000 barrels per day and if it achieves this, it would help Heirs Oil become one of the largest indigenous operators in the country by output, alongside Seplat Petroleum Development Company, Atlas Petroleum International and Oranto Petroleum, Aiteo Eastern E&P, Shoreline and First Exploration & Petroleum Development Company.
The company explained that the focus is to try to take this asset back to its peak production levels within a few years and aims to achieve its target through the procurement of new and more effective equipment, which had fallen by the wayside under Shell.
Heirs Oil, a joint venture between Heirs Holdings and Transcorp, purchased a 45 per cent stake in the block last month, after securing $1.1 billion from the lenders.
It is regarded as one of the largest oil and gas financings in Africa in more than a decade, particularly in which a Nigerian firm acquired the assets of an international oil major.
Since the federal government enacted its Local Content Law in 2010, indigenous operators in Nigeria have made substantial contributions to domestic hydrocarbon output.
According to official figures, before COVID-19, independent firms were producing 400,000 barrels per day, accounting for about one-fifth of the country’s crude oil production.
Heirs Holdings’ subsidiary, Tenoil, is the operator of OPL 2008 under a production sharing contract with NNPC. Tenoil also owns the Ata Marginal Field, which will commence production in Q2, 2021, with 3,500 barrels of oil per day.
