A coalition of civil society organizations in the country on Friday called on the incoming administration to immediately unfold its action plan and the energy transition.
The coalition said although gas could serve as a formidable source for foreign exchange or solution to the country’s short-term domestic energy development needs, betting big on gas in the long term could bring huge risks.
Specifically, the coalition said given Nigeria’s limited success experience in turning gas into energy at home, particularly in the three years of the implementation of the government’s Decade of Gas policy, a plan within 90 days of assumption of office on how to develop the country’s gas sector was desirable.
Details of plan, the group said, should include how the new administration intends to achieve its objectives in the gas sector and the sources of finance for gas projects going forward.
“With sources of financing of gas projects becoming very limited at this point, we suspect the incoming government could be forced into borrowing billions of dollars to fund new gas infrastructure.
“This would consume the government’s scarce revenues and foreign exchange. It would also add to the rapidly ballooning public debt and diversion of monies from other urgent priorities projects.
“Given the high volume of uncompleted projects and the limited funding available, the incoming government must let Nigerians know what its gas project priority areas are, and how the plans for gas would key into Nigeria’s more expanded energy transition plan,” the group said.
The Group emphasised the need for transparency and public consultation around the new government’s gas plans, saying these are crucial for ensuring stakeholders buy-in and drive a sustainable implementation process.
The incoming government, the group said, should state in clear terms how it intends to engage civil society organizations and other stakeholders to monitor and track the implementation of the Decade of Gas policy.
The group decried the history of chronic blackouts and grid failures; chronic reliance on private generators and dangerous unhealthy household fuels in the country, saying despite wasting tens of billions of dollars in uncompleted, and underperforming projects in the energy sector, almost half the Nigerian population remain in darkness.
Lack of access to power, and it observed, has continued to stifle the country’s economic growth and driven more Nigerians into extreme poverty.
It recalled that in 2021, the then Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, emphasized the need for Nigeria to continue to rely on natural gas as a transition fuel for key power generation.
Under Sylva’s leadership, the Group said the ‘Decade of Gas’ policy heralded a new pathway to a gas-powered economy by 2030.
However, despite Nigeria having the largest gas reserves in Africa and the ninth largest in the world, with over 200 trillion cubic feet (tcf) of estimated reserves, the group said successive Nigerian governments have not translated this resource into sustainable economic development.
Instead, it said leaders have set ambitious, unmet targets and rolled out a series of largely unimplemented plans, including 2008’s Gas Master Plan in 2008; the 2017 National Gas Policy, and most recently, the 2021 Decade of Gas Policy.
These initiatives were expected to power more homes and businesses, reduce subsidies by promoting compressed natural gas (CNG) as alternative for transportation fuel for transportation and improve access to clean cooking usage with liquified petroleum gas (LPG).
It was also expected to improve gas supply and reduce gas flaring through the Nigerian Gas Flare Commercialization Programme (NGFCP), which it observed, has encountered a number of false starts.
Regardless, the group acknowledged some positive strides in the sector through the Petroleum Industry Act (PIA) 2021, with the separation of gas business from the oil business, and the strengthening of the governance and fiscal frameworks.
However, it noted that the PIA provided investments for new oil and gas projects more than the critical gas infrastructure needs, while the midstream and downstream infrastructure fund targeted environmental remediation rather than bridging the infrastructure deficit in it was expects to address.
Again, the Group said the power sector has remained over regulated as a disincentive to the gas-to-power expansion.
With the global energy transition gathering steam, the group said Nigeria’s Energy Transition Plan, must strive to meet its global commitments, by outlining a shift from household consumption of kerosene and firewood to biomass and gas for clean cooking; from fuel to compressed natural gas (CNG) for transportation, and increasing gas for power generation, before ultimately shifting over to renewables.
The coalition called on the incoming government to take the necessary steps to publish a comprehensive, realistic and detailed cost of the Decade of Gas Policy, with clear roles for state, non-state actors and investors with periodic progress updates.
Also, the coalition wants the new government to fast track the implementation of the PIA and improve enforcement of regulations to hold all projects to higher operational standards, specifically decommissioning and community relations.
Other demands include clarifying the role of subnational governments and agencies in the implementation of national gas and energy transition policies; provision of a detailed outline of the investment mobilization for critical infrastructure needed to address the wide dearth of gas industry infrastructure across the value chain.
In addition, the group was a proper assessment of the risks involved with gas expansion and create a strategy to minimize the impacts, maximize the benefits, phase out oil and gas assets and plan for a post-oil and gas future, while outlining a detailed plan to end gas flaring and provide progress updates on the gas flare commercialization programme designed to reduce host community exposure to toxins and increase gas supply.
A communique by the coalition was signed by Natural Resource Governance Institute (NRGI), African Initiative for Transparency, Accountability and Responsible Leadership (AFRITAL), Stakeholder Democracy Network (SDN), Policy Alert, Paradigm Leadership Support Initiative (PLSI), Media Initiative for Transparency in Extractive Industries (MITEI), Centre for Journalism Innovation and Development (CJID), Healthy Life Development Initiative (HELDi), Youths and Environmental Advocacy Centre (YEAC-Nigeria), Centre for Transparency Advocacy (CTA), Women in Extractives (WiE), Gas Alert for Sustainable Initiative (GASIN), Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre (CISLAC), Centre for Environmental Human Rights and Development (CEHRD), Spaces for Change (S4C), BudgIT Foundation, Africa Oil and Gas Report, Good Governance Africa (GGA), NEXTIER Gas & Energy Transition, Centre for Climate Change and Development (CCD)]
