The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation on Wednesday said its ongoing reform was geared towards transforming it from an oil and gas company into an integrated energy outfit with interest in power generation and transmission.

It also stated that the country’s power transmission capacity was inadequate, adding that this was the major reason for the poor supply of electricity nationwide.

The Group Managing Director, NNPC, Dr. Maikanti Baru, stated this at the 53rd International Conference and Exhibition of the Nigerian Mining and Geosciences Society in Abuja.

He said the corporation had identified opportunities in the power sector and was ready to take advantage of them to transform from being a gas supplier to the power sector into a major player in the industry.

In a statement by the Group General Manager, Group Public Affairs Division, Mr. Ndu Ughamadu, the NNPC boss stated that the corporation was already working on a project to generate four megawatts of electricity, while also exploring the possibility of investing in the transmission segment of the power sector.

Baru explained that the corporation’s decision to diversify into the power sector was hinged on the need to bridge the huge energy gap in the Nigerian market.

He said that contrary to the impression that the poor power situation was caused by inadequate gas supply, the real problem was insufficient transmission capacity.

The GMD said there was enough gas to generate 8,000MW of electricity but the transmission grid could not support such quantum of power without complications.

Baru also defended the Federal Government’s plan to transform illegal refineries in the Niger Delta into legal entities for proper integration of the youth in the region.

He argued that getting the youth to form consortia to set up 1,000 barrels per day modular refineries would get them off criminality and create jobs.

In the upstream sub-sector, he said his goal was to accelerate frontier exploration and grow the crude oil reserve to 40 billion barrels from the current 37 billion.

In another development, the corporation has raised the alarm about the existence of some dubious syndicates who specialise in extorting money from unsuspecting people under the pretext of a purported recruitment exercise and promise of phantom job placements in the oil firm.

According to Ughamadu, the NNPC currently does not conduct any recruitment exercise and the corporation will advertise vacant positions whenever it has need to embark on a recruitment.

Source: PUNCH