Oil exploration in the Bida Basin

There are two fundamental errors in the presentation of Mr. Daniel Adugbo entitled, “The long wait for Bida’s first oil” published on page 19 of the Daily Trust of Monday, March 27, 2017. The first error is the impression created in the commentary that the Governor of Niger State, Alhaji Abubakar Sani Bello is not doing anything to ensure that the Bida Basin is included in the exercise to resume oil exploration in the North. The second error is the impression created that all that is needed to include the Bida Basin in the exercise to resume oil exploration in the North is to send the report of the Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida University research group on crude oil to the Federal Government. Nothing could be farther from the truth than the misrepresentations indicated above.

As a researcher with a robust knowledge of the issues that define the subject matter of oil exploration in Northern Nigeria, I have it on good authority that His Excellency, Alhaji Abubakar Sani Bello has concluded plans for the Niger State Government to organize a Symposium at Minna, next month (April 2017) on “the oil exploration prospects of the Bida Basin”. The Symposium, which is said to have attracted the weighty support of the Etsu Nupe, Alhaji (Dr) Yahaya Abubakar, is a forum where experts in the oil industry are expected to critically analyze the contents of the report of the IBB University research group on crude oil supervised by the Standing Committee on Bida Basin headed by Lt. Gen. Wushishi. Anybody with a modicum of knowledge about oil exploration will appreciate the fact that the kind of activity - a symposium - which Governor Sani Bello is said to have planned for the Bida Basin is the first and most important step to take in the enterprise under review.

Again, the proposed Minna Symposium is a platform where experts are expected to try to confirm whether geochemical analysis on samples collected from the Bida Basin has shown a range of Total Organic Carbon (TOC) of between 0.4 and 3.5 per cent, the organic matter content that indicates an oil window. It is equally at the Minna Symposium that petroleum engineers are expected to appraise the prospectivity of the Bida Basin when the latest 3-D or 4-D technology is deployed. The truth is that while the 2-D seismic data computation is suitable for oil exploration in the Niger Delta which is entirely a siliciclastic sedimentary basin, the 3-D and 4-D seismic data computation which have been successfully used to drill oil in Niger and Chad republics, may be amenable to the Bida Basin because findings have suggested that the formation is a siliciclastic/carbonate sequence.

There is no doubt that the work of the research team of the IBB university on the hydrocarbon prospects of the Bida Basin cannot be wished away from the enterprise to resume oil exploration in the North. This explains why the proposed Minna Symposium is said to have projected the work of researchers as the main issue for deliberation. However, to suggest that all that is needed to include the Bida Basin in the renewed drive to resume oil exploration in the North is only for the Niger State Government to send representations from the study report to President Buhari is to institute a joke on oil exploration to ridiculous ends. The work of the IBB university researchers is not the last word on the hydrocarbon prospects of the Bida Basin. There are other numerous enterprises symposium on the petroliferous nature of the Bida Basin, public hearings by the Senate and the House of Representatives on the funding challenges of oil exploration in the Bida Basin, etc - to be executed before oil prospecting companies and the Federal Government (through the Frontier Exploration Services (FES) in the NAPIMS Division of the NNPC) can embark on oil exploration activities in the Bida Basin.

This brings us to the issue of a stand-alone agency to coordinate the search for oil in the Bida Basin. There is no evidence anywhere in the world that such agencies have been used to coordinate the search for crude oil. Even if the establishment of such an agency is the way to go, what is wrong in the use of the already existing structures of the NNPC to coordinate the search for crude oil in the Bida Basin? What special expertise is this stand-alone agency going to introduce to oil exploration in the Bida Basin that the NNPC cannot do? In any case, if large

The truth is that while the 2-D seismic data computation is suitable for oil exploration in the Niger Delta which is entirely a siliciclastic sedimentary basin, the 3-D and 4-D seismic data computation which have been successfully used to drill oil in Niger and Chad republics, may be amenable to the Bida Basin because findings have suggested that the formation is a siliciclastic/carbonate sequence First, the contents of the IBB university research report must be subjected to critical analysis at a symposium or seminar where oil industry experts are expected to make a strong case for the commercial exploitation of crude oil deposits in the Bida Basin. This would be the best way to get the Federal Government to include the Bida Basin in the renewed drive to resume oil exploration in the North

quantity of hydrocarbon has been discovered in the Bida Basin as recently announced by the Director of IBB University Research Centre, Prof. Nuhu Obaje, is the next logical step not that of getting oil prospecting companies to bid for oil blocks in the Bida Basin? Why should the Federal Government be made “to set up a stand-alone agency to explore new deposits in Northern Nigeria”, when there already exist NAPIMS to do the same job?

It is very important to end this commentary by emphasizing the point that to successfully explore hydrocarbon deposits in the Bida Basin, the following measures must be embarked upon. First, the contents of the IBB university research report must be subjected to critical analysis at a symposium or seminar where oil industry experts are expected to make a strong case for the commercial exploitation of crude oil deposits in the Bida Basin. This would be the best way to get the Federal Government to include the Bida Basin in the renewed drive to resume oil exploration in the North. Merely sending the report of the IBB University research group to the NNPC or President Muhammadu Buhari will serve no useful purpose. Two, the NNPC should be directed to use its exploration outfit - NAPIMS - to commence oil exploration activities in the Bida Basin based on the 3-D and 4-D seismic data computation system. Three, the National Assembly should be made to appropriate adequate funding for crude oil exploitation in the Bida Basin in the 2017 budgetary estimates and those of the coming years in the future. Mr. Nkemjika wrote this piece from Abuja.