January 26, 2005

Oil giant teams with Nigeria to construct natural gas plant

LAGOS, Nigeria

Oil giant Exxon Mobil Corp. is teaming up with Nigeria’s state-owned oil company to build a plant to produce natural gas on the country’s Atlantic coast for markets in Europe and the United States.

Udom Inoyo, spokesman for Exxon Mobil’s Nigerian subsidiary, said an agreement was signed last week with the Nigerian National Petroleum Corp. to cover a preliminary engineering design for the plant to be located on Bonny Island, on the southeastern Niger Delta coast.

Inoyo said an initial production of 4.8 million tonnes a year was being targeted. He gave no details of project cost or dates.

The project is another addition to a string of gas projects oil multinational companies have underway in the West African country.

Bonny Island is already the site of the Nigerian Liquefied Natural Gas plant, operated by Royal Dut- ch/Shell Group of Cos. with the Nigerian state oil firm, France’s Total SA and Italy’s ENI SPA as partners.

The plant has grown from an initial investment of $3.8 billion (U.S.) in 1999, when it began production, to over $10 billion (U.S.) after several expansions.

Energy companies ChevronTexaco Corp. and British Gas will join Nigeria’s state-owned oil firm in building another $6 billion (U.S.) liquefied natural gas plant, Nigerian government and ChevronTexaco officials report.

Construction of the plant, in the Atlantic coastal town of Olokola in Nigeria’s southwest, will start in 2006.

The Associated Press

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