By Foluso Ogunsan
PACEGATE Energy & Resources Limited (PEARL) has launched a drilling fluids manufacturing plant in Nigeria and by extension West Africa.
The company will formulate specialised drilling fluids at this ultramodern plant located in Ilupeju, an industrial estate located in the north of Lagos, Nigeria’s commercial city.
PEARL says that the oil field chemicals to be produced fall into three categories including:
- Corrosion Inhibitors, Biocides, Oxygen and H2S Scavengers, Scale/Salt Inhibitors and Desolvers for Asset Protection and Integrity.
- Demulsifiers, Defoamers, Flocculant and Water Clarifier or Deoiler for Phase Treatment and Separation.
- Depressants/Removers, Gas Hydrate Inhibitors and Well Stimulation fluids for Flow Assurance and Well Stimulation Chemicals.
Other products include Glycols, Solvents Amines, Alcohol, Industrial Chemicals, Cleaner and degreasers for the refining and transportation industry.
“We are specialised in things that will enhance stability of drilling activity”, the company says. The chemical plant has a production capacity of 12,900 Metric Tonnes per annum.
The idea to venture into manufacturing of drilling chemicals for the upstream hydrocarbon industry, has so impressed the Nigerian Content Development Monitoring Board (NCDMB), that the agency awarded PEARL the “Nigerian Equipment Certificate”, guaranteeing PEARL the first right of refusal to the chemicals produced and coming out of the facility by hydrocarbon producing companies and their service-related affiliates.
PEARL was established in 2020 as an indigenous local content company seeking to provide indigenous oilfield solution via chemistry to the oil and gas drilling, refining and transportation sectors of the economy. It exclusively represents Canadian Energy Services, its technical partners, in Africa through the ADIPRO.
Manoj Kirpalani, a second generation Indian-Nigerian who is PEARL’s Chairman, traces the history of its existence from 1979 when it was formed by his father as an importer of finished goods to an in-country manufacturer of specialised production chemicals that it is today.
Niyi Adebayo, Nigeria’s Minister of Investments and Trade who formally commissioned the plant, described it as “first local content chemicals manufacturing plant in Nigeria”.
The Ilupeju facility includes a steel drum manufacturing plant, a chemicals manufacturing plant and a laboratory and has a branch in Port-Harcourt, in eastern Nigeria. PEARL also has plans to open up another arm at the Lekki free Trade Zone, a growing industrial suburb in the east of Lagos in the coming years, targeting exports.
“As long as crude oil is still being extracted here, production chemicals are our primary focus. Our secondary focus is gas treatment chemicals as gas grows here”, says Umesh Amarani, PEARL’s Managing Director.
