Stakeholders in the Petroleum Industry are currently meeting to harmonise the draft Midstream and Downstream Petroleum (Safety) Regulations and Petroleum Measurement Regulations to enhance operations of the sector.
The event tagged “Stakeholder’s Consultation Forum on Regulations”, billed to hold from Oct. 4 to Oct. 6, is being organised by the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA).
The Authority Chief Executive (ACE), NMDPRA, Malam Farouk Ahmed stated this at the inauguration of the forum on Tuesday in Abuja.
He said the event was meant to get input of the stakeholders on the drafted regulations.
The authority had in Aug. 1, began review of first set of the midstream and downstream petroleum regulations to bequeath the industry with laws and policies to enable investment in the sector.
The 10 regulations considered were: Petroleum (Transportation and Shipment) Regulations; Assignment and Transfer of Licence and Permit Regulations.
It also included Midstream and Downstream Petroleum (Operations) Regulations; Petroleum Pipeline Regulations, Gas Pricing Domestic Demand and Delivery Regulations, and Natural Gas Pipeline Tariff Regulations.
Others were Midstream and Downstream Decommissioning and Abandonment Regulations; Environmental Regulations for Midstream and Downstream Operations, Midstream and Downstream Gas Infrastructure Fund Regulations and Environmental Remediation Funds Regulations.
Farouk, represented by Mr Ogbugo Ukoha, Executive Director, Distribution Systems, Storage and Retailing Infrastructure, NMDPRA, said the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) provided that before it could finalise a regulation, such regulation must be subjected to public scrutiny.
He said the PIA also required the authority to publish the regulations in the media for members of the public to have input in the draft regulation.
“We are required to publish this regulations when we finish drafting, whether by website, newspaper or any other means, and after 21 days that this has been published to the public, we are required to obtaine feedback from the public.
“The feedback could be either by written or a forum where they can also come and let us know if we have gotten it right with what we have proposed in the regulation or make inputs.
“What we are doing today is a continuation of what we did few months ago, it is in compliance to the PIA. Few months ago we sent out and published 10 drafted regulations, collaborated with stakeholders and got feedback from them at that time.
“Now again, we have brought out two drafted regulations, the first one is on safety and this is very important to this industry, the second one is on measurement of product whether crude or refined product, to pass from one hand to the other.
“You know in a value chain, we have a lot of operators, we have the one that will bring the products, buy, store and transport the products, “ he said.
He said that as they changed custody, there has to be measurement to guard against dispute, adding the authority was optimistic that there would be positive outcome at the end of the stakeholders meeting.
