Bonny crude exports to hit 2-year high
Repairs to sabotaged oil facilities in the Niger Delta will help to push exports of Nigeria’s benchmark crude oil to the highest since early-2008, trade sources said on Friday.
According to preliminary loading programmes, Bonny Light output will average 285,000 barrels per day (bpd) in November, up from 245,000 bpd planned in October.
Production of the gasoline-rich crude has long been hampered by militant sabotage on vulnerable pipelines and platforms in the oil-rich wetland region, the heartland of Africa’s biggest oil and gas industry.
Sabotage attacks heightened in intensity in mid-2008 and operator Royal Dutch Shell (RDSa.L) has struggled to recapture prior output levels ever since.
But a government amnesty last year, which saw thousands of former militants hand over weapons in return for clemency, brought a halt to attacks, encouraging Shell to repair damaged infrastructure and build a new pipeline.
Bonny Light output reached a peak of nearly 500,000 bpd in 2005 when it accounted for nearly one-fifth of the total crude output from Africa’s most populous nation.
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