DPR Contributes N90b to Federation Account, Issues 1001 Fresh Licenses

The Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), said it has contributed over N90 billion to the federation account within the first quarter of 2009.
This was disclosed  by the Acting Director of the agency, Mr Billy Agha while briefing news men on its activities between January and March, 2009. He gave the breakdown to include: N89 billion from royalty, N743.6 million from gas flared penalty, N26.5 million from concession rentals and N237.3 million from miscellaneous oil revenues.
Giving further insight into its activities, the agency’s boss disclosed that it had also issued 1001 licences and permits, even as he added that  through the National Data Repository Centre (NDR), the department was able to ensure the provision of seismic processing and interpretation suite for independent assessment of oil and gas blocks, implementation of Geographic Information Systems (GIS), for the effective monitoring of oilfield facilities and electronic processing of DPR licences and permits.
According to him,  crude oil production for first quarter of 2009 was 770 million barrels (mmb), a decrease of four per cent against the 805.1 mmb produced within the corresponding period in 2008. Seismic data acquisition within the period also declined by 31 per cent from 1,408.352 sq km acquired in 2008 to 1,070.12 sq km in 2009.
He lamented the activities of Niger Delta militants saying these have made things fairly difficult for the agency especially in the area of seismic data acquisition, crude oil production, production deferment and gas production and flare down.
Notwithstanding, he disclosed that the nation’s crude oil production for the first quarter of 2009, from the 174 fields in operation exceeded the 220,000 barrels of oil per day (BOPD) production quota set for the country by the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Companies (OPEC).
"As at January 1, 2009, the nation’s oil reserves was at 32.71 billion barrels, condensate reserves was 5.20 billion barrels, 97.02 trillion standard cubic feet of associated and 85.52 trillion standard cubic feet of non associated gas.
"There is an observed net decrease of oil reserves of 219.57 million barrels against January 2008 reserves, representing about 0.67 per cent decline, while gas reserves dropped by 2120.98 billion standard cubic feet or 1.15 per cent against 2008 figure," he stated.