ABUJA, Nigeria, June 14 (UPI) -- Multiple fires on an oil pipeline in Nigeria means Shell won't be able to meet some contractual obligations for June or July, the company said.
Shell had planned to deliver more than 240,000 barrels of Bonny Light crude oil from Nigeria in June and 204,000 barrels for July, Bloomberg News reports. The company was forced to declare force majeure in Nigeria because of a pipeline leak early this year. A force majeure was declared Monday because of fires on the Trans Niger pipeline, the news agency adds.
Nigeria is the largest oil producer in Africa and the No. 5 exporter of crude oil to the United States.
The Bodo community in Nigeria filed a class-action lawsuit in London in May for an oil spill in the Niger Delta. The community blames Shell for many of the oil spills in the region.
The Bodo suit involves a leak believed to be from an oil pipeline that dumped crude oil into the Bodo creek for about four months in summer 2008. Shell said it didn't know of the problem for several months.
Shell and other oil companies working in Nigeria blame sabotage oil bandits like the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta for many spills.
The United Nations estimated that at least 6,800 oil spills occurred in the area from 1976-2001.
No immediate cause was given for the fire on the Trans Niger pipeline.
