Senior Oil Production Specialist and energy expert, Dr. Yussif Sulemana, has called on government to revitalize the local refinery base of the petroleum sector this year.
Sharing his expectation for the sector with The Vaultz News, he explained that considering the downstream sector, the nation is lacking in local refinery base and as such the need for revitalization.
“So in this New Year, I think government has to make a concerted effort to revitalize our local refinery base”.
Dr. Yussif Sulemana
According to Dr. Sulemana, government must revisit the idea of the Petroleum Hub discussed last year and make efforts to source funds to let the petroleum project come to fruition.
The Oil Specialist intimated that prices are volatile and are going to continue to be more volatile even in the coming months but asked that there should be a seamless link between the upstream and downstream sector.
“And that runs through the upstream and downstream sector. Whiles high prices are favorable at the upstream side, your downstream side maybe struggling. The pressure at the pumps continues to be high and it might continue to be”.
Dr. Yussif Sulemana
Dr. Sulemana asked government to ensure these two sectors are linked to ensure that a concerted plan and strategy is put in place so that whatever gains are made upstream, can be cascaded down to the downstream.
“We have done that before when we used the SPT at a point in time to support the upstream when oil prices collapsed. And so, we just need a concerted strategy to replicate that”.
Dr. Yussif Sulemana
The energy expert indicated that if such a step is not taken, with the downstream controlling the entire energy sector, goods and services will increase and drain the entire economy. He then called on government to ensure prices remain stable despite the difficulty due to external factors and take proactive steps to ensure that “the pumps are cooled”.
Petroleum and power sector collaboration
Dr. Yussif Sulemana further called for a collaboration between the petroleum and the power sector and the development of the nation’s gas infrastructure base so that power can be delivered to the end user on competitive bases. He asked the energy sector to also prepare itself for the renewable drive through investments.
“I think the energy sector is not too small to accommodate parallel investment for both renewables and the world of hydrocarbon”.
Dr. Yussif Sulemana
Touching on efforts in the sector last year, Dr. Yussif stated that the sector had a lot of activities within the upstream going on. The National Oil Company (NOC), he revealed, acquired some assets in two different areas and the Independent Oil Companies (IOCs) that is Tullow and ENI both made efforts to increase their reserve bases in Ghana.
“Tullow made efforts to invest over 4 billion within a decade. I can say with certainty that we have a lot of activities going on within the upstream. Especially what I found very appealing was the fact [that] the GNPC made some effort to acquire assets. Assets that a lot of experts criticized especially with the aspect of money which was also legitimate”.
Dr. Yussif Sulemana
The energy expert stated that the move was a great one because the energy sector needs to take care of its destiny, resources and develop the technical know-how so that at a point in time when the IOCs leave, the sector can be in a better position to take care of the upstream portfolio.
Dr. Sulemana urged GNPC to continue its effort in making sure that the asset that are profitable that can easily fetch the nation money is made crucial. He explained that the upstream and downstream sectors are very critical and then the ability to make gains in each of these streams will determine whether progress is being made within the energy sector or not.
However, in the course of last year, he noted that much wasn’t seen happening in the downstream apart from the business as usual of importing finished products to end user.
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