On Wednesday, The Nigerian Midstream, and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority has announced that a new gas pricing template for the power sector and gas-based industries has been developed and currently awaits the approval of President Bola Tinubu.

It was also disclosed that the legacy gas debts of the power sector to gas suppliers in Nigeria had risen to about $1bn, as efforts were ongoing to finalise the figures and find a comfortable way in addressing the debts.

During the inauguration of the Decade of Gas Secretariat in Abuja, the secretariat's Coordinator, and immediate past President, of Nigeria Gas Association, Ed Ubong, has said that it was important for the government to clear the gas debts in order to boost investors' confidence in gas investments.

On why legacy power sector gas debts should be addressed, Ubong disclosed to journalists, "It is clear to us that we need to provide comfort to investors by clearing the arrears that the gas companies are owed, particularly for gas supply to power.

"That is a key priority, at least you heard from the Special Adviser to the President on Energy speak about it, that it is also part of the work that is ongoing and should be completed."

When asked by journalists to state the amount of outstanding arrears for gas supplied to the power sector, he replied, "From our estimate, we think that those numbers could be between $700m and $1bn in debts owed.

"But it is something we will sit with Nigeria Electricity Liability Management Company Limited and the Federal Government to finalise and find a comfortable way in sorting this."

Ubong further noted that the NMDPRA had been working on gas pricing over the past year, adding that a lot of consultation had been done with various stakeholders on this.

Earlier, the Chief Executive, NMDPRA, Farouk Ahmed, explained that discussions we ongoing on the new gas pricing tenmplate.

"It is for further discussions. We will discuss this with the adviser of the President on Energy. So until such interaction is completed and the President apprOves it, we will not be able to disclose the price.

"But basically it is the price that gas is sold to the industry, whether gas-to-power, gas-to-industries, as well as gas-to-commercial. And it is to incentivise the producers so that they can produce more gas and supply to the country, rather than committing only to export," he said.

He also explained that on the Decade of Gas, it was a government project aimed at making sure that from 2021 to 2030 Nigeria propagated the supply and distribution of gas as the nexus of energy to power, gas-based industries, and for commercial purposes.