Special Adviser to President Ahmed Tinubu on Energy, Mrs. Olu Arowolo Verheijen, has said that Nigeria is now positioned to tap into $90 billion in financing that will be available for deepwater projects around the world by international oil companies (IOCs) already operating in the country.

She stated that accessing 20 per cent of this would be more than enough to bring five major deepwater projects onstream, unlocking 1.3 billion barrels of oil equivalent (boe).

Speaking yesterday at an executive session of Energy Institute Nigeria and the Nigerian Association of Petroleum Explorationists (NAPE)in Lagos, she said the development was as a result of reforms in the sector.

Verheijen said: “The question that would naturally follow any extended discussion of reforms is obvious- What has the administration’s ambitious reform program delivered so far?

“Because the reforms targeted actual bottlenecks and real projects in the investment pipelines, In April this year, FID was reached on the Ubeta Non-Associated Gas project, a half-a billion dollar project.

The Ubeta field was discovered in 1965 and has finally been unlocked to deliver prosperity of multitudes of Nigerian lives and businesses.

“For deepwater gas, we have gone from a total absence of a fiscal framework to now having one for the first time in our history. Nigeria’s deepwater oil projects now deliver competitive returns. Nigeria has now moved from bottom quartile of 13 indexed countries to top three.