Reps: $750m lost yearly to flaring.
The Federal Government has restated its resolve to eliminate gas flaring by 2025 as part of a strategy to harness the nation’s gas resources for maximum economic benefit and in compliance with global agreements.
Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, said on Monday when he addressed the House of Representatives Joint Committee on Gas Resources, Environment and Climate Change, on the need to end gas flaring in the country.
The House of Representatives said the nation was losing $750 million yearly to flared gas which would have been used to generate electricity.
Sylva said the country has “actually reduced gas flaring significantly to a very minimal level of eight per cent. If you all recall, last year the ministry of petroleum started what we call the National Gas Expansion Programme and we declared 2020 as the year of gas.
“At the beginning of this year, we declared 2021, the beginning of the gas decade. We believe that with all the programmes we have in place, we are on course to achieve complete elimination of gas flaring by year 2025”.
Also speaking, the Minister of Environment, Dr. Muhammed Abubakar said gas flaring was one environmental challenge the nation must struggle to put an end to, adding that the menace was a contributor to issues of global warming that has attracted lots of international attention.
Represented by the Director of Environment, in the Ministry, Abbah Suleman, the minister said: “The fear that the earth might snowball into a runaway greenhouse effect as we have on planet Venus is one of major reasons why it has been globally accepted that all hands must be on deck to ensure that gas flares are totally put out.
“The Federal Government has made commitments to the Paris Agreement of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change through our intended national determined contribution”.
