Groundbreaking of 614km Ajaokuta-Kano gas pipeline project soon – NNPC

 The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) said arrangements are being concluded for the historic groundbreaking of the 40 inches x 614 kilomertre Ajaokuta-Kaduna-Kano (AKK) gas pipeline and stations in the weeks ahead.

NNPC said following last week’s signing of contract agreements for the engineering, procurement, construction, commissioning and financing for Lots 1&3 of the over $2.8bn trans-Nigeria gas pipeline project, measures had been activated for the flag off of what has been described as the single biggest gas pipeline project in the history of oil and gas operation in Nigeria.

The Group General Manager, Public Affairs, NNPC, Ndu Ughamadu, said upon completion, 24 months from now, the AKK gas pipeline would enable connectivity between the East, West and North, which was currently non-existent, and that it would also enable gas supply and utilisation to key commercial centres in the northern corridor with the attendant positive spin-off on power generation and industrial growth.

Providing details of the contract awarded to a consortium of indigenous and Chinese companies under a 100 per cent contractor financing model, the NNPC said Lot 1, with total length of 40 inches x 200km stretching from Ajaokuta to Abuja Terminal Gas Station awarded to the OilServe/Oando Consortium, had a contract value of about $855m.

Lot 2, which contract agreement is yet to be executed, covers 40 inches x 193km, stretching from Abuja to Kaduna with contract value of about $835m.

NNPC said Lot 3 which ran from Kaduna Terminal Gas Station (TGS) to Kano TGS with total length of 40 inches x 221km was awarded to Brentex/China Petroleum Pipeline Bureau (CPP) Consortium under a contract value of about $1.2bn.

The above brings the total value of the entire project to over $2.8bn as approved by the Federal Executive Council (FEC) at its 46th meeting on December 13, 2017.

For a long time NNPC had activated aggressive gas reforms and implementation drive requiring accelerated implementation of gas pipeline infrastructure development with specific focus on critical pipeline infrastructure to power plants and industries.

Between 2010 and now, almost 500km of pipelines had been completed, commissioned and now are delivering gas. Some of the completed pipelines are Oben-Geregu (196km), Escravos-Warri-Oben (110km), Emuren-Itoki (50km), Itoki-Olorunshogo (31km), Imo River-Alaoji (24km) and Ukanafun-Calabar pipeline (128km).