Gas infrastructure deficit requires $2bn annually, says FG

The Federal Government on Tuesday put the estimated amount required to bridge Nigeria’s gas infrastructure deficit at $2bn annually. The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Chief Timipre Sylva, disclosed this at the inauguration of the Governing Council of the Midstream and Downstream Gas Infrastructure Fund.

He said a key cause of poor gas production, gas flaring and low domestic gas utilisation was the gas infrastructure deficit across the country.

Sylva, therefore, charged the nine-member council to work seriously to mobilise funds for the provision of the critical infrastructure for the gas industry.

The minister was quoted in a statement issued in Abuja by his media aide, Horatius Egua, as saying, “It is estimated that more than $20bn yearly will be required over the next 10 years to bridge these gaps.”

He said the council would drive economic development and prosperity for the nation and its partners in accordance with the Petroleum Industry Act 2021.

In March 2021, the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), declared January 1, 2021 to December 31, 2030 as ‘The Decade of gas development for Nigeria’, primarily to set the roadmap towards a gas-powered economy by 2030.

Sylva noted that though the Federal Government had put in place several programmes towards achieving the decade of gas initiatives and developing the huge gas potentials of the country, the missing link was the absence of the basic gas infrastructure to help realise the objectives.