Gas flares in Nigeria fall lowest in 8 years, still trail climate change target

While gas flaring in Nigeria has fallen the most in eight years, it is still far away from global climate change targets.

In Nigeria’s oil-rich delta, people live within 4 kilometres (2.5 miles) of a gas flare site, where associated gas is burnt during oil recovery.

There are over 178 flare sites in Nigeria, which emit poisonous chemicals that make people sick and damage the farming and fishing industries, at the same time causing acid rain, cancer, and a host of respiratory problems.

Data from the Nigeria Gas Flare Tracker (GFT), a satellite-based technology, created by the National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency (NOSDRA), indicate that gas flaring reduced from 423 billion cubic feet in 2013 to 354 billion in 2020, and the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) showing flared gas dropped from 271.38 billion cubic feet in 2015 to 222.61 billion cubic feet in 2020 suggests progress.

However, upon closer examination, these data cast doubts on Nigeria’s ability to meet the timeline set by the Paris Agreement, of which Nigeria is a signatory and which commits countries to eliminate gas flaring by 2030.

“Considering Nigeria’s past antecedence, the chances of meeting the new targets are a bit slim; we have a long way to go,” Charles Majomi, an energy consultant and managing director of Trajan Energy Limited, states.

Most of the oil fields in Nigeria still routinely flare huge amounts of gas, preferring to pay a fine than make the huge technological investment required to capture the flared gas to the chagrin of many.

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“For me, gas flaring is a threat to my fundamental right to life because gas flaring hampers my right to a clean environment,” Luqman Agboola, head of energy and infrastructure at Sofidam Capital, says, noting, “Communities don’t know the difference between day and night because they go to bed with active gas flare sights.”

Nigeria loses money and critical gas feedstock that could power plants due to gas flares. In 2020 alone, natural gas valued at $1.24 billion was burned by oil companies, one which could generate electricity for many Nigerian citizens, according to Nigeria Gas Flare Tracker.

This is further worsened by the loss of $1 billion worth of revenue, owing to the inability to capture and commercialise associated gas, the satellite tracker reveals.

Adogbeji Ideh, a medical doctor and former chair at the Nigeria Medical Association, notes that the flaring of gas has made living in Niger Delta extremely difficult.

“People breathe in petroleum products and gas every morning, every afternoon, every evening. So that you now have quite a lot of upper respiratory tract infections, you now have people developing asthma and so many other lung diseases,” Ideh says.

He notes that there are quite a lot of other ailments in the communities caused by gas flaring, which nobody is aware of because of the lack of hospitals.

Despite reducing the volume of its flared gas, Nigeria is still one of the top seven gas flaring countries. Last month, the World Bank said Nigeria and six other countries contributed roughly two-thirds or 65 percent of global gas flaring in 2020.

“Nigeria previously pledged to end gas flaring by 2020 under its National Gas Policy, a target it did not come close to meeting,” Carbon Brief, a UK-based website covering the latest developments in climate science, climate policy, and energy policy, said.

Over the years, Nigeria has not kept its word to end this 60-year-old environmentally harmful practice of gas flaring. Rather, it has missed out on ending gas flaring on at least seven occasions.

For instance, the move to extinguish all flares by 1979 (under the Associated Gas Re-injection Act of 1979) could not be met; however, the Federal Government officially banned gas flaring in 1984.

The Federal Government also failed to meet the new date of 2004 while the next target of the Nigeria Gas Master plan of 2008 was also not achievable.

By 2016, the government again extended the deadline to end gas flaring to 2020. Another challenge greeted the country and the world over: novel coronavirus.

The country is now targeting 2025 to end the environmentally unfriendly, health-damaging, and resource-losing act.

Recently, the Nigerian government has taken new steps to reduce flaring. In 2019, a Nigerian Gas Flare Commercialisation Programme was passed, which aims to sell flare gas to third parties. This will help convert gases that are of no value to oil refineries into valuable energy resources.

On February 28, 2020, the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) announced 200 bidders had been shortlisted from 800 companies who expressed interest in converting associated gas for commercial use. More than one year after, there is no official statement about the exercise.

Past regulations have also tried to accurately document the amount of gas that is being flared on a day-to-day basis and to enforce stronger penalties on companies for flaring violations. But most experts say penalties are often too low to deter oil companies.

President Muhammadu Buhari has expressed readiness to change this through the National Gas Expansion Programme, which seeks to deepen domestic usage of natural gas through the conversion of fuel-powered cars and generators from petrol to gas.