Nigeria’s oil production has slipped below the 1 million barrel per day mark, according to new data from the upstream regulator. The decline in August has seen Nigeria fall to fourth largest producer in Africa, from first.
The Nigerian Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) has reported oil output of 972,394 bpd in August. This is down from the 1.083mn bpd recorded for July.
© Supplied by Energy VoiceCondensate production has also fallen. The country produced 25,076 bpd of blended condensate, down from 33,736 bpd, and 182,052 bpd of unblended, down from 196,439 bpd.
OilX CEO and co-founder Florian Thaler said Nigeria had dropped to fourth place among the African producers, behind Algeria, Libya and Angola.
“We expect a small increase of production in September vs August in Nigeria as exports so far in September are higher compared to August,” Thaler said.
OPEC’s secondary sources figure for July reported Nigeria’s oil production at 1.17mn bpd.
OPEC has not yet published its data for August. The organisation uses NUPRC data for its direct communication figure, while secondary sources – often seen as the more reliable figure – comes from a number of market participants.
Nigeria is the largest producer in Africa, but recent declines have seen this position challenged.
Angola produced 1.177mn bpd in July, according to the country’s regulator. Algeria produced 1.018mn bpd in July. OilX had Algeria ahead of Nigeria by a small margin in August. Libya’s National Oil Corp. (NOC), in early September, reported production had reached 1.22mn bpd.
OilX figures show Nigeria overtaking Algeria in September.
Feeling the squeeze
Nigeria’s government has warned of a shortfall in revenues this year, in part because of the under performing oil sector. In an updated budget, published in August, the state said it had reduced its expected production from the original figure of 1.88mn bpd to 1.6mn bpd.
Actual production in 2021 was 1.48mn bpd. The state expects production to rise to 1.69mn bpd in 2023 and 1.83mn bpd in 2024.
Revenues to the Nigerian federal government, as of April, were 51% below expectations. The country had earned 285.38 billion naira ($668.3mn), only 39% of the budgeted amount.
OilX’s Thaler said the root cause of Nigeria’s problems “are Forcados, Bonny and Brass”. These three export terminals saw production fall by around 418,000 bpd in August, from January.
“Our contacts on the ground suggest that the loading operations have yet to resume at Forcados Terminal as repairs work is still ongoing,” Thaler said. He forecast full operations may resume by the end of September.
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