Nigeria’s economic hub Lagos has joined the league the country’s oil producing states after Yinka Folawiyo Petroleum Company Limited (YFP) started the production of crude oil from its Aje Field located in Block OML 113, offshore Lagos.

The firm said oil produced from the Aje field will be stored on the Front Puffin, which has production capacity of 40,000 barrels of oil per day and storage capacity of 750,000 barrels.

Aje is an offshore field located in OML 113 in the Dahomey Basin in the Southwest. The field is situated in water depths ranging from 100 to 1,000 metres, about 24 km from the coast.

Its Chairman Tunde Folawiyo said: “The attainment of this milestone is indeed a laudable achievement not just for YFP but for the Nigerian oil and gas industry as a whole and indeed Lagos State which can now be addressed as an oil producing state. Recording this achievement in the present global oil climate together with the peculiar challenges of the field is clearly no mean feat.”

A statement endorsed by its General Manager, Bolaji Musa, said the oil firm is a wholly owned Nigerian company and Operator of OML113. The other partners are: New Age Exploration Nigeria Limited, EER (Colobus) Nigeria Limited, Pan Petroleum (Panoro Energy) Aje Limited and PR Oil & Gas Nigeria Limited.

“After over 25 years of exploratory, appraisal and developmental activities, YFP has successfully pioneered the opening of the Frontier Benin Embayment. The Aje Field is the first field to record production from this part of Nigeria and is the first production outside of the Niger Delta.

“Commissioning of the Front Puffin FPSO was successfully completed after its arrival in Nigeria on 16th March 2016.

“We are very proud of and appreciative of the efforts, determination and commitment, of the entire Aje Project team past and present, the constant support from our regulators, the DPR and Ministry of Petroleum and our financiers. We believe this crucial support will spur us on to even greater achievements.

“The Aje Field contains hydrocarbon resources in sandstone reservoirs in three main levels – a Turonian gas condensate reservoir, a Cenomanian oil reservoir and an Albian gas condensate reservoir,” YFP added.

•Adapted from a Nation report. Photo shows offshore oil rig.