…Targets 10 biofuel complexes nationwide
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has disclosed plans to power all its retail outlets by means of Solar PV facilities, as part of its expanded programme on providing renewable energy solutions.
Group Managing Director of the Corporation Dr Maikanti Baru disclosed this during the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in China with Nigerian-Chinese consortia for the development of sustainable biofuels in Nigeria, on the sidelines of the Forum for China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) Summit Tuesday.
Dr Baru added that the corporation plan to develop grid and off-grid solar power as a business and contribution to the clean fuels initiative of the Federal Government.
The aspiration for the exploitation of renewable fuel resources in Nigeria is to implement nationally determined contributions to the Paris Agreement, part of which requires the blending of 10percent by volume of fuel-ethanol in gasoline and 20percent by volume of biodiesel in automotive gas oil (diesel) for use in the transportation sector.
During the meeting two separate MoUs on the biofuels project development were signed between NNPC and the OBAX-COMPLANT Consortium and NNPC and the CAPEGATE-NANNING Consortium respectively.
Baru, said the MoUs signing would help implement government’s mandate on clean, alternative and renewable energy programmes, particularly automotive biofuels production nationwide.
He added that for a country like Nigeria with a daily consumption of over 65million litres of automotive fuels, it was easy to see that enormous volumes of fuel-ethanol and biodiesel would be needed to meet this obligation. Meeting and sustaining the target, he said, will require strategic investment in more than 10 large biofuels complexes across the country.
He said however, that the execution of the two MoUs would help develop the first biofuel production complex in Nigeria, adding that before the end of the year, the development of at least three other complexes would commence.
Dr Baru urged the consortium to commence the implementation of the biofuels projects without any further delay noting that preliminary studies on the programme show clear financial indices that are very encouraging for business growth.
The NNPC biofuels programme centres around sugarcane-fuel ethanol production, cassava-fuel ethanol production as well as oil palm-based biodiesel production.