Comments on naijablog: More stats - this time on gas flaring..

the politics of oil flaring in nigeria and the afr...

2008-03-03T00:43:00.000+01:00

the politics of oil flaring in nigeria and the african continent in general can only be properly addressed when a responsive leadership finally emerges from within the people. as presidential hopeful, barack obama would say, real change comes from bottom up and not the other way. it will take a real leader with actual mandate to stand up to the multinationals to demand a change of attitude; multinationals like chevron who have come to the sad conclusion that it is more cost effective to just flare the gas than to put then into a more effective and more environmental friendly use. from re-injecting the gas back to the ground to lng to piping them to homes across west africa, africa and even europe. russia sends her gas to europe through a network of criss-crossing pipelines throughout europe and asia. what africa needs is to insist on a working very effective real people's democracy whereby it can get a leader who will be responsive to the people. until then, nothing good will ever come out of the several discussions on oil flaring in nigeria cum africa.

www.meniru.blogspot.com

the politics of oil flaring in nigeria and the afr...

2008-03-03T00:41:00.000+01:00

The fact that the imprint of multinational oil com...

2008-02-06T00:17:00.000+01:00

The fact that the imprint of multinational oil companies in Nigeria has been one of environmental degradation and exploition of human rights cannot be denied. But the question is this: who does the responsibility for making amends lie with? While justice implies that these multinationals should adhere to certain ethics, when they fail, doesnt the responsibility lie with the host government? While companies should become neither irrelevant or impediments to this process, their very founding purpose is profit-not justice. . . the burden of responsibility rests on the shoulders of the Nigerian government, and when they fail- it rests on us: the Nigerian people.

$32 billion of gas is not flared yearly. Let's put...

2008-02-03T12:44:00.000+01:00

$32 billion of gas is not flared yearly. Let's put it in perspective. Nigeria as a whole earned $15 billion from Oil last year. It earned $1 billion from gas last year. The assumption is that Nigeria flares between 50 - 70% of gas produced. That means that it is flaring between $2 to $3 billion in gas a year (the discrepancy is due to the JV arrangements of 70% to NNPC.) So what I think the analyst from Houston did was to say that the entire total flaring done is equal to the annual flaring done. I mean it's bad enough as it is, but let's not make it worse than it actually is :D

What oil companies? What oil majors? Is it that in...

2008-02-02T21:00:00.000+01:00

What oil companies? What oil majors? Is it that in a country of 140million people there are so few intelligent people? or that there are so few who bother to look up the facts and analyse the situation intelligently?

Lets take a look one by one at the 'oil majors' whose operations lead to gas flaring shall we:-

1 - SPDC (Operator of the NNPC/Shell/Elf/Agip joint venture generally referred to as Shell)

SPDC is 70% own by NNPC (the investment vehicle of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in the Oil Industry) i.e. SPDC is 70% own by the Federal Republic of Nigeria. 20-25% owned by Royal Dutch Shell.

2 - MPN (Operator of the NNPC/ExxonMobil joint venture, generally referred to as Mobil)

Mobil Producing Nigeria Unlimited is 70% owned by NNPC i.e. 70% owned by the Federal Republic of Nigeria, and 30% owned by ExxonMobil.

3 - Chevron Nigeria Ltd (Operator of the Chevron/NNPC joint venture generally referred to as Chevron)

Chevron Nigeria Ltd is 70% owned by the federal republic of Nigeria and 30% owned by ChevronTexaco international.

4 - SNEPCO (Shell Nigeria Exploration and Production Company)

100% owned by Royal Dutch Shell, Operates Deep offshore fields like EA and Bonga which is hundreds of miles of the coast of Nigeria in deep offshore Atlantic waters.

Anyway, I'm sure by now you get the point i'm trying to make. The deep offshore gas is hardly flared and where they are flared they are less harmful because they are so far away from anywhere and the technology used in deep offshore drilling allows for easy solutions to flaring.

The problem we have is with onshore, creeks and shallow water flaring, these are kinds of flares that produce the lights you see in the Delta and harm people, these flares are almost entirely the responsibility of the Federal Republic of Nigeria because Nigeria is the majority stake holder in the businesses that flare these gases.

Enough with the left wing drivel, look at the facts, the oil companies are not to blame, the federal govt will play dumb always and play the innocent victim of Multinationals pressure. The solution to gas flaring is simple, here are the possibilities:

1 - FG can give give directive to end all oil operations that flare gas in the Delta, i.e. they can ask themselves (NNPC) to stop operation, but they wont do this cos they will be losing money.

2 - FG can come up with 70% of the cash needed to convert to new technology and bury rather than flare the gas, but of course they wont cos it will cost them too much, why should they use money they can embezzle to save lives in the Delta, rubbish.

3 - FG can finally f*%$%*g realise that government has no business in business, deregulate the downstream oil industry, phase out the subsidy, allow the market to do the trick. What trick I hear you ask? Well the trick is: if all of the above is done, someone will take a punt on the flared gas, someone will invest in gathering that flared gas and sell it to power generating stations, industries, etc, someone will smell a profit and monetise that flared gas and we all will live happily ever after.

I love Nigeria but I'm afraid the oil majors are not blame for this one, the oil majors after all are running businesses not a charity!

A.J.

It's cheap to flare gas in a nation with little in...

2008-02-02T04:39:00.000+01:00

It's cheap to flare gas in a nation with little industrial base. As long as the oil majors don't consider it profitable to liquefy the gas and do something with it, this will go on.

what an absolute outrage!My family used to live in...

2008-02-01T20:13:00.000+01:00

what an absolute outrage!My family used to live in Port Harcourt, and it never got completely dark because the flares were always there on the horizon. The oil companies who have done exemplify the sort of strip-and-guzzle policies Walter Rodney and others have described, and THEY, too, in addition to stopping the flaring, should start paying some serious reparations.

Atrocious.

2008-02-01T19:09:00.000+01:00

Atrocious.