By Teddy Nwanunobi
TotalEnergies has affirmed in a statement that it would hand over the East African Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP) project to a new holding company by September 2021.
The EACOP General Manager, Mr. Martin Tiffen, said that a new holding company will take overall pipeline-related operations from TotalEnergies E&P, which TotalEnergies has been running the project since 2016.
“The oil pipeline works are expected to commence by September, next month. While construction is scheduled to kick off in the second half of 2022.
“Everything that the EACOP project needs in order to function will be managed by the new holding company which was stipulated in the EACOP’s Shareholders Agreement that was signed on April 11, 2021.
“Our current timetable is to have the EACOP company fully up and running by September. Since 2016, it’s been TotalEnergies taking the lead on the EACOP project, and whilst we continue to do that, we want the EACOP company itself, in which all the pipeline shareholders have a stake.
“Once EACOP company is fully constituted and operational, it will take the lead on the project,” he said.
The East Africa crude oil pipeline will stretch approximately 1,443 kilometres, from the future Kabaale Industrial Park in the Hoima district of Uganda to the Chongoleani peninsula near the Tanga Port in Tanzania.
The Ugandan section of the pipeline will be approximately 296 kilometre-long, starting near Hoima, close to Lake Albert, and traversing 10 districts and 25 sub-counties to the Tanzanian border between Masaka and Bukoba.
The Tanzanian section will comprise approximately 80 per cent of the pipeline’s total route length.
It will run for approximately 1,147 kilometres, from the Uganda-Tanzania border and traverse eight regions and 25 districts to terminate at a peninsula north of Tanga in Tanzania.
EACOP is an integral part of the co-development of three projects, which are the EACOP project, together with Tilenga and Kingfisher. Tilenga and Kingfisher will drill the wells and process the oil to export quality.
While part of the production will be made available to the refinery project, and the rest of the daily production will be sent via EACOP to be sold into world markets.
EACOP is 80 per cent in Tanzania, in terms of length, and 20 per cent, in Uganda.
The project cost is estimated at $3.55 billion.