From Uche Usim, Abuja and Rose Ejembi, Makurdi
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Ondo State Government to establish a 65 million litre per annum biofuel plant in Okeluse, Ondo State.
The multi-million dollar project when completed, will among other things, create over one million jobs via the production of cassava feedstock, ensure unimpeded supply of petroleum products and safeguard the environment with reduction in carbon emission,
Speaking when the Governor of Ondo State, Mr. Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, led a delegation to the NNPC headquarters for the MoU signing ceremony, the Group Managing Director of the NNPC, Dr. Maikanti Baru, explained that the project was not a one-hundred-per-cent NNPC subsidiary but that some investors were also bringing in Foreign Direct Investment into the country for the project.
On other benefits of the project, the GMD said it will reduce fuel importation and stem greenhouse gas emission to combat global warming.
“We expect that this plant, when built, will be producing at least 65 million litres per annum of fuel ethanol that could be blended into our Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) to be used in Nigeria and neighbouring countries when exported,” Baru informed.
Earlier, the Governor of Ondo State, Mr. Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, expressed confidence that the biofuel project would take off for the benefit of the people of the state and the country in general.
Meanwhile, Dr. Maikanti Baru, has assured that the two biofuel projects being executed in Benue State would create more than one million direct and indirect jobs for the host communities in Benue.
The GMD who paid a courtesy call on Governor Samuel Ortom at the Government House in Makurdi yesterday explained that the visit was in fulfillment of the Presidential directive given the NNPC by President Muhammadu Buhari in 2015 to resume oil exploration activities in some of the nation’s inland basins including the Benue trough and the Chad basin.
Baru who posited that the visit was also to kick start high-profile stakeholders engagement towards the two biofuel projects in the state noted that his organisation had already commissioned Environmental Baseline studies on seismic acquisition operations.