The Minister of Petroleum, Emmanuel Armah Kofi Buah says the passage of the Petroleum (Exploration and Production) Act 2016 and the development of a number of subsidiary legislation to give better effect to the Act, have contributed to Ghana maintaining its position as a preferred investment destination in the sub-region despite the downturn in the global oil and gas industry.

According to him the coming into force of the Local Content Regulation, L. I. 2204 has created an enabling environment for Ghanaian companies to favourably participate in the oil and gas sector. He said the completion of the Atuabo Gas Processing plant is enabling the delivery of lean gas to power the thermal plants as well as indigenous LPG to more than half of the domestic market, “as a result the long queues for LPG have vanished,” he said at press briefing in Accra on Tuesday.

The Minister also revealed that Ghana was preparing to acquire a third Floating Production Storage Offloading (FBSO)vessel to receive lean gas from the Sankofa Gye-Nyame (OCTP) Oil Field.

The new FBSO, which is more than 80 per cent complete in Singapore, would be operating from the Onshore Receiving Facility at Sanzule-Ellembelle in the Western Region, which is being constructed.

In line with that, First Lady Mrs Lordina Mahama and the Minister are billed to travel to Singapore to inspect and name the new FBSO.

Ghana already has two FPSOs, the FBSO Kwame Nkrumah and the FPSO Professor John Evans Atta Mills which are producing oil from the Jubilee and TEN Fields.

The TEN fields, presently adding about 35,000 barrels of oil per day (bopd) is expected to ramp up to 80,000 bopd.

The Jubilee field remains steady in production despite challenges with a cumulative production from the field as at September, being approximately 181 million barrels of oil and 41 billion cubic feet (bcf) of gas exported to the Gas processing plants and about 80 mmscfd supplied to power plants to generate electricity.

Addressing the media at the meet-the-press- series in Accra, Mr Buah said the cost of the FBSO under construction is about US$1.2 billion. The installation of the various subsea infrastructure and equipment is currently on-going, whilst the OCTP Field is expected to produce 45,000bdp of oils commencing first quarter 2017 and 180 mmscfd in the first half of 2018.

“With the two FBSOs in place, a third one in the offing, and a number of projects at the appraisal and development levels, Ghana is poised to become one of the major oil producers in sub-Sahara Africa,” Mr Buah said.