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With a final investment decision (FID) on the Coral South floating liquefied natural gas (LNG) development imminent, Eni and its partners have signed a sales and purchase agreement with BP to buy all its production. BP will use LNG from the contract to help meet its global supply commitments. The company said the agreement, signed on 4 October, covered the purchase of LNG for over 20 years, and would contribute to the diversification of its portfolio beyond the end of the decade. The agreement is conditional on FID being reached, which is expected by year-end.

Anadarko Petroleum has said an attack on 21 February in which a contractor was killed did not target its gas project and it would carry on preparing for a final investment decision (FID). “The evidence to date indicates both the convoy and a car belonging to a contractor encountered an existing event, which did not directly target our contract personnel, nor the LNG project, nor airstrip,” Anadarko said in a statement on 5 March. “The Mozambique government recognises security in the region requires additional attention and action.

Electricity generation across Nigeria reached 4GW in July, the Presidential Task Force on Power has announced. This is a step forward for Nigeria’s chronically underperforming industry, but shows that output remains way off peak demand of 14GW. Similarly, the transmission network’s capacity reached a new peak of 4.6GW as of 30 July, but this was not enough to fight off fierce criticism of Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN).TCN is run under management contract by Canada’s Manitoba Hydro International (MHI).

Claiming the challenges that had stalled the sale of three national integrated power projects (NIPPs) had been overcome, the Abuja government approved the privatisation of the Calabar, Geregu and Omotosho thermal plants last October. But there are still significant barriers to the government’s aspiration to add 5GW of capacity with the moribund NIPPs’ revival, according to sources canvassed by African Energy.Against a difficult macroeconomic background and still dysfunctional electricity supply industry, the privatisation of the NIPP plants has struggled.

Military power may have subdued Cabo Delgado’s jihadist insurgency, but an atmosphere of pervasive insecurity persists with consequences for major liquefied natural gas projects. TotalEnergies-operated Mozambique LNG is still under force majeure, while ExxonMobil is looking to alter its Rovuma LNG design and Eni is proposing adding a second phase to the offshore Coral Sul, writes Marc Howard.

The successful introduction of gas to the vessel means the Mozambique is on track to export its first cargo of liquified natural gas (LNG) in H2 2022.

After years of delay, the Petroleum Industry Bill has finally been approved by Nigeria’s parliament – albeit in different versions by the National Assembly’s two chambers. It promises substantial benefits for gas and other under-performing hydrocarbons-based industries and reforms to areas of government in profound need of overhaul. The critical question remains whether the bill is enough to galvanise the economy and industry when implementation could take many years, write Jon Marks and Ajay Ubhi

Following initial overtures, the decision to co-develop the Nigeria-Morocco Gas Pipeline as a gas superhighway linking Nigeria and other gas producers with over a dozen markets along its route – and inland to supply landlocked countries via spurs – was agreed by King Mohammed VI and President Muhammadu Buhari, during the Moroccan monarch’s late 2016 state visit to Nigeria.

The official founding of the Cairo-based East Mediterranean Gas Forum pits its six members and several national and multilateral observers against Turkey’s aggressive Mari Vatan (Blue Homeland) doctrine for establishing maritime economic hegemony. At a 22 September ceremony, Egypt’s petroleum minister Tarek El-Molla said other countries were welcome “as long as they are in line with the forum’s goals to achieve the welfare of the region’s countries and their people and… reject acts of violence hindering regional prosperity”.

International oil companies (IOCs) are considering several routes in parallel to exploit offshore gas resources in the eastern Mediterranean. It is too early to say which route or routes will be chosen, although at least two broad proposals for uniting the production from fields in Egyptian, Cypriot and Israeli waters are on the table. Connections to existing Egyptian infrastructure currently dominate the discussions as it is both the strongest domestic market and the easiest route for potential exports. Eni, BG Group and Israel’s Delek Group have all signalled their enthusiasm for projects that will be dependent on Egyptian offtakers.

The incoming administration in Accra is faced with a power industry dominated by heavily indebted public utilities, inadequate regulation and 43 power purchase agreements signed by the Electricity Company of Ghana (ECG) without a clear least cost or procurement plan. With the need for additional capacity unclear, the government is focusing on transmission, distribution and renewable energy. “Energy challenges have to be seen holistically,” deputy energy minister Joseph Cudjoe told the Ghana Trade and Investment Forum in London on 28 June, adding that “the problems facing the energy sector are not technical but financial”.

An agreement signed by German economy minister Robert Habeck and Qatari Emir Sheikh Tamim Bin Hamad Al-Thani for the supply of gas to replace imports from Russia made substantial headlines in mid-March. But there are doubts over the ready availability of gas, even for the world’s largest LNG exporter, and a lack of liquefaction terminal infrastructure in Germany.

The Senegalese government’s planned expansion of generation capacity by 1GW under the Plan Sénégal Émergent will largely come from gas-to-power (GTP) and renewable energy (RE) generation.

Plans for the ambitious Nigeria-Morocco Gas Pipeline (NMGP) were given a boost in mid-October, when Mauritania and Senegal became the first two transit countries to sign memoranda of understanding (MoUs) for the 7,000km-plus project.

On 19 February, Noble Energy, the operator of the Leviathan and Tamar gas fields, announced ten-year agreements to sell Leviathan gas to privately owned gas importer Dolphinus Holdings at a firm rate of 350mcf/d from the start-up of the project at the end of 2019, and Tamar gas at an interruptible rate of 350mcf/d depending on availability. In a statement it said “the gas is anticipated to supply industrial and petrochemical customers as well as future power generation in Egypt”.