Odia, who stated this while delivering the AAU 108th inaugural lecture titled “Exploration and Exploitation of Energy Resources: Implication for Man and the Earth,” said no nation can attain the requisite development without electricity or with a high degree of energy deficiency as currently experienced by Nigeria.
He said, “I am calling on the President Bola Tinubu-led administration to declare a state of emergency in the power sector to address the nation’s energy deficiency. Nigeria Electricity Power (Power) availability is abysmal, as Nigeria tops the list of countries with the longest annual outage duration in Africa with 4,600hours. This is 3,200 hours more than the next country on the list, Niger Republic.
“Nigeria is ranked as the world’s worst country with regards to access to electricity, with about 90 million (46 per cent) of the total population not connected to the grid. Where the grid is available, which corresponds to 54% of the total population, power is only available for between 4 and 15 hours per week.
“With only about 3GW availability, Nigerian power production falls far short of demand, which is the primary constraint to the Nation’s economic growth. Nigeria’s power situation is truly miserable compared to the huge population and the desired rate of development.
“With the population now in the excess of 200 million and with the present level of determination and desire for development, Nigeria needs a generation capacity of at least 60,000MW and an available capacity of at least 40,000MW in the immediate with a solid arrangement to double the generation and available capacities before 2035.”
Odia said the national energy challenge has not gone beyond redemption, but certain steps must be taken with all the required precisions.
Beyond declaring a state of emergency in the power sector as prescribed, the professor of Energy and Power Engineering opined that the Federal Government must consider a “repeal of the privatisation of the distribution sector and introduce prepaid metering system and monitor it through remote modular connectivity,” stressing that the privatisation exercise is inimical to rural development.
He added that the government should “decentralise transmission by carving the nation into between six and 10 units and loop the units with gear switches to reduce the very rampant outages due to system failures and invest massively in generation among other things.”
Acting Vice Chancellor of the University, Prof. Asomwan Adagbonyin, said the lecture could not have come at a better time than now that Nigeria is craving industrial development powered by constant energy.
Adagbonyin noted that the lecture addressed national development and growth in the face of energy deficiency while also making recommendations on ways out of the crisis.
He added, “The exploitation, exploration, conversion, and use of energy are not without consequences which impact heavily on humans and the environment in several ways. We can only imagine how, if left unchecked, humans and the environment can be seriously threatened.”
