Okechukwu Nnodim
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation closed its 2017 financial year with an operating loss of N82bn, figures from its latest group financial and operations report have shown.
An analysis of the oil firm’s December 2017 report showed that its year-to-date expense as of the last month of last year was N3.71tn, while its revenue was put at N3.79tn.
On the individual performance of the sub-units of the oil firm, the report stated that the corporation’s headquarters posted the highest loss in the year under review.
It lost N131.94bn in 2017, followed by the Pipelines and Products Marketing Company, which posted a loss of N102.53bn.
The Nigerian Petroleum Development Company came first among the sub-units that recorded profit in 2017.
The NPDC made the highest profit as a sub-unit in the NNPC by recording N111.88bn revenue during the review period.
The corporation as a group recorded a marginal decline in December 2017, as it posted a loss of N6.37bn, as against the N6.79bn deficit of the preceding month.
The NNPC said, “This represents N0.42bn decrease in trading deficit compared to the November 2017 performance. This is attributable to the decreased cost in upstream activities especially the NPDC.
“The value gained from the NPDC was however eroded by an increased PPMC operation’s cost in an effort to ensure steady petroleum products supply across the country being the major supplier of the products.
On the refineries, the report stated that the combined capacity utilisation of the three facilities increased from 5.81 per cent to 26.99 per cent.
Nigeria’s three refineries are the Warri Refining and Petrochemical Company, the Port Harcourt Refining Company and the Kaduna Refining and Petrochemical Company.
Data from the corporation’s latest report showed that the WRPC was dormant in December 2017, while the PHRC and the KRPC produced at 41.69 per cent and 29.59 per cent, respectively during the period.
Further findings showed that the WRPC, which recorded a capacity utilisation of 20.67 per cent in November 2017, dropped to zero in December.
For the PHRC and the KRPC, their capacity utilisation in November 2017 was both zero per cent, according to the report.
The NNPC said it more than doubled the daily supply of the Premium Motor Spirit, popularly known as petrol, during the Yuletide season from about 35 million litres per day to 80 million litres per day to ensure product availability nationwide.
It also stated that following the successful AKK pipeline construction contract approval, the NNPC had started exploring the possibility of building power generating plants with combined capacity of 3,600 megawatts, adding that Abuja would have 1,350MW; Kaduna, 900MW; and Kano, 1,350MW.
The report stated that in November 2017, crude oil production in Nigeria averaged 1.96 million barrels per day, indicating a slight increase over October 2017 production, but up by 1.56 per cent relative to November 2016 performance.
“The steadiness in production is associated with the resumption of export activities at the Forcados Terminal after many months of non–operational activities as well as the engagement with the various stakeholders,” the oil firm said.
It added that the December 2017 national gas production stood at 234.08 billion standard cubic feet, translating to an average daily production of 7,551.09 million standard cubic feet per day, representing 4.41 per cent decrease over the performance of the previous month (November 2017).
The report, however, noted that the daily average natural gas supply to gas power plants was at a record high of 827.76mmscfd, equivalent to power generation of 3,342MW.
“The result when compared with November 2016 means that almost 1,000MW was added,” the NNPC said.
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