President Bola Tinubu will on October 8 inaugurate the $400 million Otakikpo Onshore Crude Oil Export Terminal in Rivers State, the first new crude export facility to be built in Nigeria in more than five decades.
The terminal, developed by Green Energy International Limited (GEIL), is located in Ikuru town, Andoni Local Government Area, and is the first wholly indigenous onshore crude terminal in the country. The last such facility, the Forcados Terminal, was commissioned in 1971.
According to GEIL, the project is expected to ease Nigeria’s crude evacuation bottlenecks, a long-standing challenge that has hindered output. The facility will provide an outlet for more than 40 stranded oil fields, potentially unlocking millions of barrels of crude previously left untapped.
With an initial storage capacity of 750,000 barrels—expandable to three million—and a loading capacity of 360,000 barrels per day, the terminal is also projected to reduce production costs for indigenous operators.
“This project is a strategic infrastructure that supports the administration’s commitment to raising output while reducing costs,” said Olusegun Ilori, GEIL’s Executive Director of Legal and Corporate Services.
GEIL Chairman and CEO, Professor Anthony Adegbulugbe, described the facility as a “game-changing national infrastructure,” noting it would allow stranded fields to contribute to the economy.
The event will be attended by key stakeholders, including the Minister of State for Petroleum (Oil), Senator Heineken Lokpobiri, Rivers State Governor, Siminalayi Fubara, and top industry players.
The development comes as the Federal Government intensifies efforts to attract investment and revive the oil sector, which has faced years of declining production, pipeline vandalism, oil theft, and rising operational costs.