Nigeria on course to end gas flaring by 2025 – Sylva

The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, said on Monday Nigeria was on course to end gas flaring by 2025.

The minister stated this at a Public Hearing on gas flaring organised by the House of Representatives in Abuja.

He said the public hearing was an opportunity to update the records and bring stakeholders up to speed on the matter.

Sylva said the elimination of gas flaring was an issue the government was taking seriously, adding that the ministry was committed to achieving the global consensus on the elimination of gas flaring by 2025.

He said: “Today, we have actually reduced gas flaring significantly to a very minimal level of eight percent.

“If you all recall, in 2020, the Ministry of Petroleum Resources started what we call the National Gas Expansion Programme and we declared the year 2020 as the year of gas.

“At the beginning of this year, we also declared year 2021 the beginning of the gas decade. We believe that with all the programmes we have in place, we are on course to achieving complete elimination of gas flaring by the year 2025.”

The minister recalled that in December 2020, the ministry rolled out a gas penetration programme.

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The ministry, according to him, was aggressively pursuing the programme to ensure effective utilisation of gas being flared today.

The Minister of Environment, Muhammed Abubakar, who was also at the public hearing, described gas flaring was a serious environmental issue.

Represented by a Director in the ministry, Mr. Abah Suleman, Abubakar said gas flaring leads to global warming.

He said: “The fear that the earth might snowball into a runaway greenhouse effect as we have on planet Venus is one of the 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.

“The Ministry of Environment is highly desirous and has been giving support to the Ministry of Petroleum in this regard as far back as 2003 when the ministry along some oil companies pushed for the use of compressed natural gas.

“I am happy to say that the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari has kick-started the programme.”

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