Shell's Forcados terminal in Nigeria to restart by June

May 3, 2007
Loading of crude from the Niger Delta's Forcados terminal could restart "sometime in June," depending on Nigeria's security situation, said Peter Voser, Royal Dutch Shell PLC chief financial officer.

Eric Watkins
Senior Correspondent

LOS ANGELES, May 3 -- Loading of crude from the Niger Delta's Forcados terminal could restart "sometime in June," depending on Nigeria's security situation, said Peter Voser, Royal Dutch Shell PLC chief financial officer.

In a conference call Voser said "there has been improvement" in the security situation but that it remains difficult. He said Shell is still assessing the damage to facilities and that resumption of production from shutdown fields would take "some time."

Voser said loading from Forcados, if it resumes, would come from 3.9 million bbl of stored oil. Meanwhile, he said, Shell had restored 10,000 b/d of previously shut down output since the end of March, bringing shutdown to 178,000 b/d from 188,000 b/d at the end of the first quarter.

Shell Petroleum Development Co., 30% owned by Shell, shut down its East Area offshore platform—along with its Forcados terminal and pipelines—following attacks by the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta earlier this year.

In January, Shell evacuated a reported 326 workers from one of its oil facilities after 16 people were killed or wounded in an attack by unidentified gunmen (OGJ, Jan. 23, 2006, p. 30).

Contact Eric Watkins at [email protected].