………..by Chiamaka Ndubuwa……
…..even while Nigeria stay focused on Gas as Transition Energy……
Rosario Osobase, Head Commercial Teranis Nigeria limited, a steel production company has said that there is the need for Nigeria to create a pathway to green hydrogen energy even as the country has a focus on gas as it’s transition energy.
Osobase maintained that Nigeria”s focus on gas as part of the efforts to close the huge energy gap which is about 40 to 50 percent in Nigeria and Africa is a fair approach to energy transition.
Speaking at the just concluded “African Women for the Energy Transition” which took place in Sheraton, Lagos and was organized by the German-Nigerian Hydrogen Office in collaboration with the Women in Green Hydrogen (WiGH) and the African Energy Chamber (AEC), Osobase said that education and awareness is key to the discussion of the progress Africa has so made to tackle climatic change. “Climate change is a threat” she said.
Osobase pointed out the need to think of drastic and accelerated way of the pathway to energy transition. “And there’s no one side way to the approach we have to take, there should be several different dimensions including Green-Hydrogen and why is Green-Hydrogen important? From my own research I see that Green-Hydrogen is very important to the rate of net zero and decarbonization in the sense when we are thinking of our decarbonization context as a country or as African continent.
“It is important that while we focus on natural gas in the midterm view we need to also look at the long term view for the posterity of our generations to come so that being said what we must do to be ready for the market given the complexity of the gas infrastructure..
“The first thing I will always say is to begins with Leadership, visionary leadership always comes with a lot of policy formation that guides the pace of the development of a renewable energy including gas as our own transition fuel as well so the second one is to develop a well clear regulatory framework.
According to her the European Union is doing a lot now in response to the global energy crisis occasioned by the Russian/ Ukraine war. “You would see that E.U has taken its stance where they brought out a plan called REPOWER E.U, it’s a very simple plan but I find it more intriguing and ambitious because when we look at this, what they are planning to do is to loose complete dependancy on Russia fossils because of the global crisis you’ve seen it’s volatility in its region its destabilizing the energy fronts and metrics.
“With plans like this that are ambitious, you can see EU taking a part that’s aggressive towards not just ensuring they are lowering their carbon footprints while they are at it, there are alot of things we can learn from other countries” Osobase said.