FG GRANTS ECOPETROL PATENTS TO CURB OIL THEFT

The Nigerian government has granted two invention patents to Ecopetrol, Colombia's largest integrated oil company, for the development of tools and equipment to reduce oil theft in hydrocarbon transportation lines.

The two patents according to PRnewswire on Monday, increases the company's patent to 25, 19 of which are still in effect.

The first patent corresponds to a 'Tool for the secure removal of valves installed on fluid tubes'. The second patent was granted for the design of the 'Dosage equipment and procedure for the stoppage of derivations in fluid transportation ducts based on such equipment.'

These systems were implemented by Ecopetrol at the beginning of the 2000's with excellent results for the company, which went from registering 7,200 stolen barrels of fuel per day in its systems to approximately 300 barrels per day currently, in a strategy that combined technology, security and judicial procedures.

Both patents will be valid for a 20-year period, during which no institution or government may use them without the due licences granted by Ecopetrol.

These patents reinforce the technological advantages associated with the 'Improvement in hydrocarbon transportation' programme, led by the Colombian Oil Institute for Ecopetrol. These tools are also being patented in Colombia, Mexico, United States, Ecuador, India and Russia.

Ten per cent (around 55 million barrels) of Nigeria's oil is stolen and trafficked every year, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. It is estimated that oil production in Nigeria runs at only two thirds of capacity because of theft, vandalism and violence in the Niger Delta.

The new UNODC report, Transnational Trafficking and the Rule of Law in West Africa: A Threat Assessment, explores the practice of stealing and trafficking in oil, locally known as 'bunkering', in the Niger Delta. It identifies the traffickers and trafficking routes, the value of the stolen oil and the threat posed by oil bunkering not only to Nigeria but to West Africa as a whole.

Nigeria is said to be losing $14bn yearly to oil theft in the country.