SNEPCo' Bonga FPSO hits One Billion Barrel Milestone

SNEPCo' Managing Director, Elohor Aiboni 

By Akinola Ajibade

Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company Limited( SNEPCo) has recorded one billion-barrel oil export mark through its first deep-water exploration and production facility,  also known as Bonga.

This happens, three months after the company carried out a major turnaround maintenance  (TAM) of the facility as scheduled.

SNEPCo's Managing Director, Elohor Aiboni, said this, yesterday(Monday),  in a statement made available to the News Mirror.

According to her, the company has recorded a milestone through this means, which she describes  aa  a celebration of excellence, leadership and focused delivery with its significant benefits on Nigeria and Nigerians, in particular. 

"One billion barrels is an exciting milestone," said Aiboni, SNEPCo’ s first female Managing Director, adding, "I'm incredibly proud of all our employees and contractors who've contributed immensely to the success of the Bonga FPSO and the attainment of this remarkable achievement."

Aiboni also attributed the success of Bonga to the partnership between the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited and SNEPCo’s co-venturers – TotalEnergies EP Nigeria Limited, Nigerian Agip Oil Company, and Esso Exploration and Production Nigeria Limited.

Bonga, a Floating Production, Storage, and Offloading (FPSO) vessel, she noted, began operations in 2005, adding that the vessel is anchored 120 kilometres offshore in the Gulf of Guinea and has consistently delivered value in national revenue, local capacity development of Nigerian engineers and funding support to the service industry, in addition to its many social investment programmes in health, education and sports.

According to Aiboni, the integrated delivery approach, continuous improvement and the support lever offered by the technological prowess of the Shell Group are the pillars of SNEPCo’s excellence delivery.

 “We are building a leading safe, simpler and cost-disciplined deep-water business that brings value to our partners, shareholders and Nigeria which remains a heartland for Shell,” she said.

 Recall that the Bonga FPSO vessel has enjoyed significant expansion over the years with the further drilling of wells in Bonga Phases 2 and 3 and through a subsea tie-back that unlocked the nearby Bonga Northwest field in August 2014. Bonga Northwest can produce approximately 65,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day and was named Engineering Project of the Year 2015 at the prestigious Platts Global Energy Awards in New York. 

Similarly, the Country Chair, Shell Companies in Nigeria, Mr Osagie Okunbor said commended the resilience, focus and dedication of the entire SNEPCo team, most of whom are Nigerians. 

“I feel a strong sense of pride knowing that today, over 95 percent of SNEPCo staff, including those working on the Bonga FPSO, are trained Nigerian deep-water professionals, who daily contribute their quota, in the development of Nigeria’s deep-water hydrocarbon resources. The entire team should be incredibly proud of themselves,”Okunbor said.

In a related development, the Chief Upstream Investment Officer of NNPC’s Nigeria Upstream Investment Management Services (NUIMS), Bala Wunti, said, “The many successes recorded by Bonga have continued to trigger significant development in Nigerian’s deep-water oil and gas exploration and production, for which reason the place of Bonga in Nigeria’s upstream DNA cannot be overemphasised.”