Ghana Targets 278m Barrels Oil

By Samuel Boadi



GHANA COULD lift some 278 million barrels of oil in the first phase of its commercial oil production billed to start in the 4th quarter of this year, the Ghana National Petroleum Corporation (GNPC) has indicated.

Thomas Manu, Director of Exploration, GNPC, who disclosed this at a press conference Monday in Accra, said the fabrication of all equipment required for the exploration has been completed with most of them assembled in Ghana.

“What is left now is the installation of anchor pipes, hook-up and commissioning.”

Initially, 120,000 barrels of oil and 120,000 cubic feet of gas would be produced on a daily basis. And some $500 million is expected as revenue for the first 3 years from 2011 even though experts have noted it could be 5 times more. “This will double to $1 billion for the subsequent 10 years.”

In all, Mr Manu said 17 wells would be drilled and these would include 9 production wells, 2 gas injection wells as well as 6 water injection wells. Twenty-one vessels would be involved.

He continued that phase II of the oil production, expected to start by 2013, will involve the drilling of 25 wells which will witness the production of 240,000 barrels of oil and also 240,000 cubic feet of gas daily. He continued that GNPC will pipe gas onshore for processing at Bonwire in the Ashanti Region.

By the end of the phase II, over 100 wells would have been drilled around the Jubilee and Deep Tano fields.

Nana Boakye Asafu-Adjaye, CEO of GNPC, in an address said Ghana spent about $2 billion on oil imports from Nigeria and therefore substituting such imports with our own oil will save some foreign exchange. “It will afford us savings in freight costs and cheaper gas for all.”

He added that the Floating, Production, Storage and Offloading (FPSO) vessel is also 80 percent complete and will leave Singapore in May this year for Ghana.

In addition to the feverish preparations to make the start of the oil production a reality, he said oil giants like Chevron, Texaco, Exxon Mobil, among others, have started shifting their attention on Ghana.

Asked how the oil activity will help Ghanaians, he said the development will reduce poverty by 50 percent should an amount of $1.5 billion be invested in addition to $400 million annually.

“Between 2007 and now, Ghana’s investment needs in this area has still not been met.”

Meanwhile, GNPC has declared its readiness to buy out the Jubilee Oilfields. And this will require some $4 million. Already, two oil giants - ExxonMobil of the USA and British Petroleum (BP), reportedly are said to be engaged in a tussle over the field.

Furthermore, GNPC and Kosmos Energy are in discussions to patch up the differences which erupted between them from Kosmos’ disclosure of data on the project to investors.