Article summary
- Nigeria’s oil reserves are declining due to low exploration activities.
- The country’s oil and condensate reserves as of January 1, 2023, stand at 36.966 billion barrels, with a slight decline of 0.22% compared to January 1, 2022.
- Nigeria’s total annual upstream capital expenditure decreased by 74% from $27 billion in the year 2014 to less than $6 billion in 2022.
The Nigeria Upstream Petroleum Regulatory Commission (NUPRC) has said that the country’s oil reserves are declining due to low exploration activities.
The Commission’s Chief Executive Officer, Engr. Gbenga Komolafe stated this during a presentation he made during the just concluded Nigerian International Energy Summit (NIES), which was held in the country’s federal capital, Abuja.
According to Engr. Komolafe, the Commission’s efforts will see an increase in the country’s oil reserves soon. A part of his presentation read:
- “Our efforts are beginning to manifest in our gas reserves position, and we expect similar manifestation in oil reserves in the very short term. It is, therefore, my pleasure to declare the national hydrocarbon reserves position as of January 1, 2023, at this important forum.
- “Nigeria’s oil and condensate reserves as of January 1, 2023, stand at 31.060 billion barrels for oil and 5.906 billion barrels for condensate, making a total of 36.966 billion barrels for oil and condensate while the associated gas reserves are 102.32 trillion cubic feet, non-associated gas reserves are 106.51 trillion cubic feet, making the total of 208.83 trillion cubic feet of natural gas reserves.
- “The oil and condensate reserves decline of about 0.22% compared to January 1, 2022, figures are attributable to low exploration activities and reserves revision arising from subsurface studies in the year 2022.”
- “On the other hand, the slight increase of 0.10% in gas reserves over January 1, 2022, reserves position is primarily attributed to the revisions arising from additional information from new wells, and field development studies.”
Other important stats
According to Engr. Komolafe, Nigeria’s total annual upstream capital expenditure decreased by 74% from $27 billion in the year 2014 to less than $6 billion in 2022.
- Also, Nigeria had 17 active oil rigs in 2019 representing one of the highest counts on the African continent at the time. However, the country’s average rig count declined to 11 in 2020, seven in 2021, and 10 in 2022, but had recently begun to grow, due to new investment growth.
What you should know
As of April 2022, Nigeria had 37 billion barrels worth of oil reserves. The United States has 36 billion barrels worth of oil reserves. But In terms of production output: Nigeria produced 1.23 million barrels a day. Meanwhile, the United States produced 11.6 million barrels a day at the time.
