Nigerian LNG

One of the largest industrial projects in Africa, a liquefied natural gas (LNG) plant on the Nigerian coast at Bonny, began production in September 1999. The $3.8-billion facility has the capacity to process 7.15 billion cubic meters (252.4 Bcf) annually of LNG. 

The project consortium, Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas Limited (NLNG), is comprised of the NNPC (49%), Shell (25.6 %), Elf (15%), and ENI/Agip (10.4%).

Initially the facility will be supplied primarily from dedicated gas fields, but the NLNG has stated that half of the input gas will be associated gas (currently flared) within a few years.

Several customers have signed long-term purchase agreements with NLNG: the Italian electric utility, ENEL (49% of the production volume); Spain's Enagas (22%); Turkey's Botas (17%); Gaz de France (7%); and Transgas of Portugal (5%). The first LNG deliveries to customers were to commence in October 1999.

NLNG confirmed in mid-1999 that a third LNG production train with an annual capacity of 3.7 billion cubic meters (130.6 Bcf) will be built, increasing NLNG's overall LNG processing capacity to 10.85 billion cubic meters (383 Bcf) per year. Deliveries from the third LNG train are scheduled to begin in the fourth quarter of 2002.

NLNG announced that Enagas had signed a 21-year agreement to purchase over 70% of the third LNG train's output. Transgas signed an agreement in June 1999 to purchase an additional 1 billion cubic meters (35.3 Bcf) per year of LNG from the third train. With this agreement, NLNG has pre-sold all output from the third LNG train.

     NLNG longer-term plans include the possibility of two additional LNG trains at the Bonny complex.