LAGOS, Dec 11 (Reuters) - Nigeria is considering new
oilfield licensing rounds next year, NNPC chief Mele Kyari said
on Friday.
Africa's largest oil exporter delayed major oilfield bid
rounds this year due to COVID-19, which led to a global oil
price crash. Kyari told an online chat hosted by the Society of Petroleum
Engineers International that the current price rebound should
enable "some kind of licensing" next year, which he said could
include ultra deepwater fields.
Nigeria this year launched its first marginal oifield
licensing round in roughly two decades, fields it said were
likely to be developed by local companies and were less reliant
on limited international funding. Some of those have been
awarded, sources told Reuters, but the government has yet to
announce a full list of winners. While Nigeria's oil output is limited by a supply cut deal
between the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries
and other producing nations, led by Russia, Kyari said that by
2022 demand will recover and there will be a need for more
output.
He repeated the government's ambitious target of 3 million
barrels per day (bpd) of oil production by 2023.