Nigeria has joined several other African countries in boosting planned use of fossil gas as a “transition fuel” in its updated climate plan, reflecting the continent’s struggles to quickly ramp up renewable energy output.
The West African nation aims to have 17 gigawatts (GW) of gas-fired power capacity in 2035 – nearly double the current level and more than the target for solar and hydro power combined, according to its new nationally determined contribution (NDC) plan.
Announcing the plan at the United Nations on Wednesday, Nigeria’s vice-president Kashim Shettima said gas was a “cleaner fuel”. Specifically, the NDC justifies it as a cleaner alternative to coal in electricity generation and as a replacement for diesel in transport.
Michael Ivenso, energy director at Nigeria’s National Council on Climate Change (NCCC), told Climate Home News that Nigeria has adopted the strategy because the transition to clean energy sources “will not happen overnight [and requires] a just, gradual and practical approach”.
Nigeria – Africa’s biggest oil producer – needs “time and money to build out a sufficient installed base of renewable energy sources to support growth and development”, Ivenso added.
With plans to cut emissions by 32% from 2018 levels by 2035, the country requires $337 billion to mitigate and adapt to climate change, the climate plan says, with a fifth of the money expected to come from domestic sources, including carbon markets. The rest will come from international funding, it said in the NDC 3.0 submitted to the UN earlier this week. Shettima said the plan was Nigeria’s “highest ambition level to date”.
“Risky strategy”
According to Nigeria’s plan, greenhouse gas emissions from the natural gas industry will be reduced by phasing out routine gas flaring and reducing leaks.
Nigeria, which is plagued by unreliable and patchy power supplies, has a fossil gas reserve of about 210 trillion cubic feet, which could last for up to 93 years, the government says.
President Bola Tinubu’s administration is actively exploring the fuel’s potential, courting investors and unveiling gas infrastructure across the country. After his inauguration in 2023, Tinubu said his government would seek to add value to the nation’s gas assets, saying “it is all about growing the pie so that Nigerians will benefit”.
But critics say continuing to invest in natural gas could prove counterproductive, and more costly, in the long run – as well as making it harder for African countries to meet their commitments under the Paris Agreement.
“It is unfortunate that the Nigerian government is still planning so much fossil gas in its energy mix,” said Sofia Gonzales-Zuñiga, a senior policy analyst at the global institute Climate Analytics.
This is “a risky strategy that could either lead to stranded assets, or lock it into ongoing fossil fuel emissions, when it could be reaping the benefits of much cheaper – and cleaner – renewable energy”, she added.
Those concerns were echoed by Zainab Aliyu, a research consultant at the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative, who said Nigeria’s decision to keep betting on fossil gas was tying it to “a volatile industry at a time when the world is moving away from fossil fuels”.
Asked about the NDC’s proposal to scale up the use of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) for cooking, Rajneesh Bhuee, manager of the “Stop Funding Gas Campaign” at the NGO Recourse, said treating LPG as a “clean solution risks entrenching fossil dependence in households and exposing low-income communities to global price volatility”.
Africa’s “transition fuel”
Nigeria is not the only African country that has added intentions to ramp up natural gas use in the new cycle of UN NDCs.
Angola’s climate plan says it plans to use natural gas systems to progressively replace diesel generators in industry, saying that will drive down emissions significantly.
Similarly, Zimbabwe’s NDC said it will ramp up a new gas-fired power plant until 2036 as “although it is a fossil fuel, natural gas can replace coal and reduce emissions considerably”.
Earlier this month, at the second Africa Climate Summit in Addis Ababa, leaders in the final declaration identified “the role of transitional energy sources” – widely taken to be a reference to fossil gas – “in ensuring a just transition that safeguards the energy security of developing countries”.
Also, in January, at the Mission 300 energy summit in Tanzania, African leaders adopted a joint statement, citing gas as one of the energy sources needed to unlock “Africa’s full energy potential”.
Giza Gaspar-Martins, a former Angolan climate negotiator who served as chair of the Least Developed Countries group, said “it’s ok” for countries to use gas as a transition fuel “because it has less of a potential to increase global greenhouse gas emissions” compared with other fossil fuels.
Despite the general discouragement for continued investment in fossil fuel production, oil- and gas-producing countries, in particular, have adopted the same position to use gas as a transition fuel and “this is a reflection of national circumstances. It is what it is,” Gaspar-Martins told Climate Home News.
But climate campaigners say continuing to rely on fossil fuels, including gas, could hamper – not help – the continent’s development.
Aliyu urged policymakers to concentrate on renewables and green hydrogen, “rather than investing in a fuel source that is most likely to repeat the oil curse”.
