Aliko Dangote, Africa’s
richest man who has a net worth of $15 billion according to the Bloomberg
Billionaires Index in a bid to quadruple gas supply rate in Nigeria, said
that seismic data exploration work has commenced for the multi-billion dollar gas
pipeline network project he is embarking on, Business Day reports.
Major international
reputable firms such as the International Finance Corporation (IFC) a member of
the World Bank group has shown keen interest in this project and preliminary
meetings have been held by the parties, Dangote informed Business Day
reporters.
Dangote said the pipeline
will be capable of carrying about three billion standard cubic feet (scf) of
gas daily when completed, in a country where economic growth has long been held
down by the inability to send gas to its thermal power stations.
While Nigeria has gas
reserves of about 180 trillion cubic feet, more than any other African country,
most of what’s produced is flared or exported because of a lack of
infrastructure to transport it to local companies and households.
The Dangote Group has
plans to start laying the pipelines before the end of the year, with the
first one to become ready by mid-2017, “we are making steady progress on the
project and foresee no major hitches, Dangote said”.
When the project is completed, major oil
producing companies operating in Nigeria, like the Royal Dutch
Shell Plc. and Exxon Mobil Corp. would benefit from using the pipeline because they
currently have little incentive to sell gas produced from their fields, Dangote
added.
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