US, Nigerian Firms Target Zero Gas Flaring

Dike Onwuamaeze

Zeeco Inc of United States in collaboration with Arbel Energy and Logistics Limited (AEL), its country representative in Nigeria, would soon launch a technology that would enable Nigeria to achieve zero gas flaring and reduce emissions in its crude oil production.

The Managing Director of Zeeco, Mr. Nigel Palfreeman, who held an interactive business session in Lagos yesterday with operators in Nigeria’s oil and gas industry, said his firm’s goal was to introduce technology that would help Nigeria to recover flared gas and process it to useable standard for domestic and industrial consumption.

He added that Nigeria is the seventh largest gas flaring country in the world, which has tremendous negative impact on the environment.

“But we can recover the associated gas and put them into bottled gas that can be used for cooking and other purposes. We have got the ability to recover this gas and turn it into something useful,” he said, adding that “Nigeria has quality oil that produces more associated gas than other countries in the world. The fact is that most of the associated gas has been flared. And this is a big impact on the environment. We are doing studies to look at the gas compositions in the region,” he said.

AEL Executive Chairman, Dr. Umar Ardo, described Nigeria as a gas country with colonies of crude oil and remarked that it seemed that the country has left the elephant to be chasing the rabbit.

“We need to get the elephant, which is the gas. What we are trying to do is to bring the best technology so that Nigeria will exploit optimally its gas commercialisation policy. The world is going toward gas so we need to deal with the best in the gas industry,” he said.

Umar noted that the recovery of the associated gas through the prevention of flaring would solve the problem of environmental degradation and help to preserve the country’s forest resources.