HEAR ATIKU ON POWER - Nigerians greatest concern. I like this man now because I have never seen a Nigerian politician articulate his vision this way since Awolowo. How will you tackle power supply, compared to what President Goodluck Jonathan is doing now? I will diversify the energy mix by incorporating clean coal technology in the generation of small and medium Power plants and build captive power stations. I will develop the mini-hydro stations that are located across the nation. I will implement faithfully and with commitment the Gas to Power Master Plan drawn up in 2005 which emphasises the need for a secure and predictable gas supply to be made available to private investors in power generation. I will address the challenges confronting the power distribution companies and privatise the transmission system. I will make the power sector move investor-friendly by creating incentives. I will train a large number of technicians and engineers. Is generating power from coal a viable option? It is an option because technology has now brought a process where you can even clean the coal. That is why they call it clean coal. Over 90% of South Africa’s power comes from coal. The only thing is they are trying to clean the coal because there is a technology now that cleans it. So I don’t see anything wrong. For instance, the south-east could entirely depend on the coal deposit in Enugu and Abakaliki to generate their electricity. So also parts of the north-central, because the coal deposits in Kogi state are so substantial that you could use them and provide enough power for the north-central zone together with its hydro potential. They have small dams in Nasarawa, another one in Plateau. The Plateau one has been in existence. So what we need to do is to expand it because it supplies power to the whole of Plateau and you can extend it to other states. So there is potential for doing that. Not that we have not started… we commissioned international consultants to do that and they really gave us a good mix, and if we had gone by that mix in 2005 we would have attained sufficiency in power generation in the country, but unfortunately we abandoned that and went for gas, which is going to take a very long time He certainly knows what he is saying. Coal remain the domestic largest source of energy even in the United States as we speak.
Posted on: Wed, 12 Nov 2014 16:00:28 +0000
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