countries with lesser gas reserves. It is a riddle that, like Nigeria’s petrol importation situation, bewilders stakeholders.
It serves as an energy carrier for factories and electricity generation and alternative fuel in the face of the demand for cleaner energy. Globally, the market share of the product, standing at $20.4b in 2020 is projected to hit $26.6b by 2025.The methanol industry spans the entire globe, with production in Asia, North and South America, Europe, Africa and the Middle East. Worldwide, over 90 methanol plants have a combined production capacity of about 110 million metric tons .
BFPCL shareholders took the FID for the construction of Nigeria’s first-ever methanol plant at the cost of $3.6 billion. The plant, an integrated methanol and gas project in Odioma, Brass Island, Bayelsa State, which is scheduled to come into operation in 2024, is expected to produce 10,000 tons of methanol daily.
He explained that in July 2020, President Muhammadu Buhari, who also doubles at the Minister of Petroleum, approved the development of the Brass Gas Hub “with the sole aim of aggregating for monetising all stranded gas in the Brass area which amounts to over 14 trillion cubic feet of gas into the processing facilities to be built in the hub”
Aside from the equity from NCDMB, NNPC and DSV, there is an impressive cast of lenders which includes a consortium of Chinese banks led by the China Exim Bank, African Development Bank , international commercial banks, regional banks and African institutions and they would be expected to raise 70 per cent of the project cost.