By Tosin Omoniyi
A civil society organization, the Centre for Social Justice, CSJ, on Tuesday said that the nation lost about N225 billion ($1b) to gas flaring last year alone.
It said this was as a result of the country’s inability to exploit the approximately 295 billion standard cubic feet of natural gas that was flared within nine months of the past year.
The Lead Director, CSJ, Eze Onyekepere, said the volume of massive volume of flared gas could fuel about 7,000 mega watts of efficient thermal electricity plant if properly channeled.
Onyekepere, who spoke in Abuja at a press briefing lamented that the nation had yet to utilize fully the massive opportunities inherent in gas flaring.
“Nigeria flares about 1.2 billion cubic feet (bcf/d) of gas per day, which could fuel about 7,000 megawatts of efficient thermal electricity power, over 1,400 agro-processing facilities, 350 textile plants, 70 fertilizer plants with opportunities for creating over one million jobs. About 295 billion standard cubic feet of natural gas was flared in the nine-month period” he said.
He urged the government to quickly see to the passage of the Petroleum Industry Bill, PIB, so that the issue of gas flaring and its attendant challenges can be tackled effectively.
While calling on Nigerians to participate in funding of the gas master plan which is estimated to consume about $25 billion, the CSJ tasked the government and relevant stakeholders to fix a definite time frame to end gas flaring and also implement the Gas Re-injection Act which had rules to punish defaulting companies.
It would be recalled that Nigeria’s absence at a global forum held in April 2015 on the Zero Gas Flaring Treaty had raised questions about its commitment to ending gas flaring and its associated environmental challenges.
The forum was convened under the auspices of the Office of the United Nations Secretary-general, Ban Ki Moon, and World Bank Group President, Jim Yong Kim.
Four African countries, Angola, Cameroon, the Republic of Congo and Gabon were among the nine leading global crude oil producers that signed an agreement to end gas flaring at oil production fields by year 2030.
The participating countries and companies at the forum cumulatively account for over 30 per cent of flared gas around the world.
Nigeria, reputed as Africa’s largest crude oil and gas producer, was not listed among the signatories to the treaty.
Nigeria presently is faced with severe challenges arising from gas flaring at onshore/offshore production sites by international oil companies.
Experts say that flaring of gas contributes to climate change and impacts the environment negatively through emission of carbon monoxide, CO2, black carbon and other pollutants. It also wastes a valuable energy resource that could be used to advance the sustainable development of producing countries.
It is believed that the amount of gas flared was used for power generation; it could provide about 750 billion kWh of electricity which is more than the African continent’s current annual electricity consumption.