₦airaland Forum

Natural Gas Formation and Basins in Nigeria

Natural gas is a form of fossil fuel considered to be clean. It is a mixture of carbon-rich gases usually found in reservoirs the in the earth’s subsurface. It is usually found in deposits of oil sands, cracks of rocks, ocean beds, coal deposits, spaces of overlaying rocks, sandstone within shale formations, and sedimentary rocks.
An area of the earth’s crust marked by a thick sequence of sedimentary rocks in the earth’s crust is known as a sedimentary basin. In Nigeria, some sedimentary basins are Chad Basin, Dahomey, Sokoto Basin, Benue Trough, Niger Delta Basin, Bida Basin, and Anambra Basin.

Natural gas produced during crude oil production is called wet or associated gas (AG). AG is a mixture of other hydrocarbons, water vapour, nitrogen, carbon dioxide, and hydrogen sulfides. It is challenging to transport, contains impurities, and must be processed to derive its useful products. AG is sometimes seen as an undesirable by-product of oil production and is usually flared, thus contributing to global warming and negatively impacting health and the atmosphere from heavy greenhouse gas emissions.

According to World Bank’s Global Gas Flaring Tracker Report 2023, Nigeria is among the top nine countries contributing to gas flaring globally. Reinjecting AG into the well to boost oil production is a more beneficial alternative to flaring gas. Non-Associated Gas (NAG), or dry gas, occurs naturally and can be found in gas or condensate wells with almost no associated crude oil. NAG is, therefore, a cleaner form of fuel, hence its place as a transition fuel for Nigeria’s energy growth pathway to net zero by 2060.

A Highlight of Some Proven Gas Basins

Nigeria’s Inland Basins include Anambra, Benin, Benue Trough, Bida, and Chad. They hold potentially significant hydrocarbon reserves, with gas proven in the first three. In addition, to use in gas-based industries, these gas reserves offer opportunities for exploitation as fuel for power plants with significant benefits for gas supply security, embedded power generation, transmission load balancing, and speed of project realization.

K. Onuoha and C. Dim, in their research, “Prospects and Challenges of Developing Unconventional Petroleum Resources in the Anambra Inland Basin of Nigeria,” noted that the predominance of gas-prone facies in inland basins indicates good prospects for finding unconventional petroleum in Anambra and other Nigerian inland sedimentary basins. The Anambra Basin, located between 6°–7.8°N latitude and 6°40’–7°30’E longitude, covers Abia, Enugu, Imo, Delta, Edo, and Kogi States. According to O. L. Babatunde, in “The main oil source formations of the Anambra Basin, South-eastern Nigeria”, this basin has one of the largest sub-bituminous coal and lignite deposits with reported incidences of shale oil seepages around Lokpanta in South-eastern Nigeria. Its hydrocarbon potential might be comparable to the Niger Delta basins holding an estimated 10 trillion cubic feet of potential natural gas in reserve.

In 2004, the first serious search for oil in the Anambra basin commenced. It led to Orient Petroleum Resources Plc obtaining an oil prospecting license (OPLs 915 and 916) with authority to construct a private petroleum refinery in the region. A few successfully explored wells in the region are the Igbariam and Ugwuoba gas fields. The OML 155 (OPR); OPL 915 and 916 (Orient); OPL 907 and 917 (GEC) hold more than 10Tcf of Proven reserves and more than 20Tcf of proven probable and possible reserves. Another proven reserve is the Dahomey or Benin Basin, located on the western coast of Nigeria. It covers Nigeria’s Lagos, Ogun, and Ondo states. [/b]Also, the Benue trough extends 1000km northeast from the northern boundary of the Niger Delta to Lake Chad. [b]It spans across Bauchi, Gombe, Ebonyi, and Taraba states. Recently, the Kolmani area of Gombe and Bauchi witnessed the discovery of about 500 billion cubic feet of gas.


https://businessday.ng/paywall-free/article/exploring-inland-gas-reserves-what-is-in-it-for-nigeria/

Exploring Inland Gas Reserves: What is in it for Nigeria?

See website headline, see op headline.

Everything na ariwo sha ni

helinues:
See website headline, see op headline.

Everything na ariwo sha ni

Shatap and shout Yoruba ronu

Derrickfoster1:
Shatap and shout Yoruba ronu

Indeed Yoruba ronu terrorist..

Imo state has highest gas deposit research says

stevnwigw1:
Imo state has highest gas deposit research says

In African..