AN ambitious $25 billion project to build a gas pipeline between Nigeria and Morocco took another step forward today, with the signing of agreements with the governments of five littoral states through whose waters the line would be installed. The ultimate aim of the 7000-kilometre Nigeria-Morocco Gas Pipeline project is to send gas from Nigeria - whose resources stand at about 200 trillion cubic feet - to Europe to make up for a shortfall in Russian supplies. The project proponents are NNPC and Onhym, the state oil companies of Nigeria and Morocco, respectively. A memorandum of understanding was signed by the governments of Ghana, Gambia, Guinea, Guinea Bissau and Sierra Leone in Rabat on Tuesday. Speaking shortly after signing the MoU, Mele Kyari, NNPC's group chief executive, said that as well as Europe, African countries along the pipeline route also stands to gain a lot from the project. "Other benefits include the creation of wealth and improvement in the standard of living of our citizenry, increased co-operation between our countries while mitigating against desertification and other benefits to be derived from reduction in carbon emissions," he said. Kyari said "NNPC will facilitate the continuous supply of gas and provide other enablers such as the required land for the first compressor station to be deployed in Nigeria, which is among the 13 stations earmarked along the pipeline route." The pipeline's capacity is expected to be about 3 billion cubic feet per day.
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