Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited (SPDC) has issued a force majeure on its Forcados terminal in Delta State, due to the oil spillage and theft that took place at the terminal, thereby leading to the company loosing a huge chunk of its income.
It will be recalled that the major oil producing company in Nigeria had delayed the construction of a new floating production, storage and offloading facility, which when completed, it’s production peak is expected to be around 225,000 barrels of oil per day, with water depths that will be over 1,000 metres. This is called “The Bonga project”.
It declared force majeure on February 21 2016 in its Forcados pipeline. The pipeline itself is operated by the Nigerian Petroleum Development Company (NPDC).
Shell also stated that the right authority and security agents have been informed to carry out total investigation in order to determine the amount of oil lost due to the spillage and the cause.
Last January, Shell had announced the re-opening of its Trans Niger Pipeline, or TNP, which carries Bonny Light crude oil to the export terminal.
This pipeline was out of operation since November, 2015.