The power of coal

Whereas Nigeria has over 2.7 million tonnes in coal reserves, with the potential to produce between 10,000 to 15,000MW of power, coal continues to be largely ignored by the Nigerian government. The much touted coal-for-power plan is still a mystery. Experts in the industry say that the coal business is now a private sector business and that the coal-for-power plan can only be realised if the government backs the private sector.

An in-depth review of the solid mineral industry by NEXT, spanning over a month, reveals a despairing state of sectoral neglect, and an inconsistent legal operational framework, leading to a string of missed opportunities in a sector that experts believe could serve the nation's economy far more than what we currently make from crude oil.

Of the three hydrocarbon fuels abundant in the country - gas, oil, and coal - Nigeria seems determined to depend on just oil and gas. Although the Nigerian minister of Power, Rilwan Remi Babalola, struggles to meet the much advertised 6,000MW by December, 2009, there seems to be no concrete plans to source energy from coal.

"This is the same question that I have been asking the government, why can't we use coal? They are not sure why they are not doing it! The government, truly they don't know," says Kashim Ali, the president of the Nigerian Society of Engineers.

Once the primary source of energy

A century ago, when Nigeria was yet to discover oil, coal was Nigeria's primary source of electrical energy. Soon after the discovery of oil, coal production plunged from an all time high of 900,000 tonnes to zero level as Nigeria abandoned coal for oil. In the words of Mr. Ali, "We felt that we were now civilised and we were now too clean for dirty coal."

Coal was one of the first solid minerals to be discovered in Nigeria. The discovery of coal in 1909 in Udi, Enugu State eventually led to the construction of a railway between Enugu and Port Harcourt in 1914.

The coal mines and the railway immediately led to the creation of thousands of jobs not only for the mines and railway but for petty traders and service providers. Migrant workers flocked in, new settlements were established and the towns grew. Enugu State today owes its development to the discovery of coal.

The discovery of crude in Nigeria, the civil war, and the subsequent indigenisation of policies in the mining sector led to the collapse of the coal industry. Coal production took a plunge from over 900,000 tonnes in 1959 to zero production between 1966 and 1970, the period of the civil war. Production never recovered after that. Although modest production continued into the early nineties, the Nigerian Coal Corporation has not operated any coal mines for several years.

"Prior to the Nigerian civil war, coal in Enugu was used to generate electricity in Oji river power station. It was also used to drive the steam engines of our local train. Coal was also used to run the power of the Nigerian cement industry at Nkalagu and also exported to Ghana," says Luke Mamah, a professor of Geology at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka.

"Both of these infrastructures for coal consumption have since collapsed leading to the death of the coal industry itself," Mr. Mamah said, adding that the advent of oil began the process for the eventual collapse of the coal industry.

Coal for power

"We have to diversify to coal... it is not a matter of if, it is a matter of when because coal is the cheapest source of power," says Philip Pereira, a miner of 17 years whose company has interests in coal. According to Mr. Pereira, Nigeria needs to follow the examples of other countries like the US, China, South Africa, and Australia, that rely heavily on coal for electricity.

He explained however that the establishment of a coal to power system is very expensive. "Let me be frank with you, you need heavy money to get this going in the correct way. To put up a power station of 1000MW, you are talking 1.5 to 2 billion dollars. So you can imagine how much we'd need for 5000MW; we are talking 10billion dollars," he said.

For him, building up a coal dependent electric power system cannot be done overnight. Mr. Pereira explained that it could take about seven years to build a 5,000MW power system dependent on coal adding that the development of the coal sector implies job creation, community development, and industrialisation while presenting options for cheaper energy.

"This is industrialisation. The coal industry is married to the power industry. 10 years from now, we could be supplying at least 24 million tonnes of coal yearly to power stations to supply between 5,000 to 10,000MW of power," Mr. Pereira said.

Coal Energy vs. Nuclear Energy

With a redundant coal industry, and ignoring its electric power potentials, the federal government began to steer towards nuclear energy. Uranium, one of Nigeria's 34 solid minerals, has been described as ‘one of the most desired elements by third world countries', likely for the prospects of power generation and nuclear power. In Nigeria, uranium may have emerged the preferred mineral in the federal government's plan for increased electric power generation.

Perhaps, encouraged by the knowledge that 6 of the country's states have uranium deposits, the Nigeria Atomic Energy Commission was activated in 2006. Two years later, a committee was set up by the federal government to produce a road map for the development of Uranium with the view of increasing the country's power output.

Sunday Jonah, Head, Reactor Engineering Section at the Centre for Energy Research and Training at the Ahmadu Bello University-Zaria, believes that the interest in uranium is in line with the exploration of clean energy options.

"There is the ‘nuclear renaissance' now because nuclear energy does not produce green house gases and it is the most probable energy for the future vis-a-vis the use of hydrogen as fuel. Nuclear energy is the only source of energy that can be used for the large scale clean hydrogen production," Mr. Jonah said to NEXT.

Mr. Pereira however says that Nigeria has no need to worry about CO2 emissions from a coal to power project and explained to NEXT the clean coal technology, especially the ‘carbon capture and storage', which he plans to explore. CO2, one of the green house gases which contribute to global warming, is a by product from coal-powered electricity generation. The carbon capture and storage technology involves a series of chemical reactions which uses stored CO2 as a raw material to produce hydrocarbons, thus increasing oil reserves.

"CO2 can be captured and used to increase the yield of the oil fields. The CO2 is injected and it increases the yield by 15%. That is quite significant. When you pump CO2 into the ground, you get a 15% increase in your oil," Mr. Pereira said, adding that his company planned to explore the options of capturing, storing and reselling of CO2, which is a by product of the coal to power process.

The new clean coal technology is evolving and there are many research projects in process to improve on available techniques. Coal continues to remain the major source of electricity, In the USA, Germany and India, more than 50% of electricity is generated from coal.

In Nigeria, the prospect for coal goes beyond electric power generation. It offers hopes for industrialisation, community development, and job creation. The minister of Mines and Steel Development, Diezani Alison-Madueke, has also claimed that the industry can create as much as 20 million jobs.