Nigeria to Re-Focus on Renewable Energy – Kachikwu

By GBENGA OGUNDARE

The Minister of State for Petroleum Resources and Group Managing Director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC), Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, has emphasized the need for Nigeria to give serious consideration to renewable energy as the solution to its energy challenges.
Speaking in an interview on the sidelines of the World Future Energy Summit currently in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, the Minister acknowledged that crude oil and gas are exhaustible resources, noting that the way to make energy accessible to Nigerians in every nook and cranny of the country is to exploit renewable energy sources.
“We need to refocus a lot more effectively on alternative energy resources, particularly solar energy. There is really no reason why a country like Nigeria should not have more of its power supply from solar. President Buhari  is very focused on this. This is something we are going to apply a lot more energy to in the days ahead”, Kachikwu stated.
He said he did not believe that the exploration of renewable energy would pose a competition to the petroleum industry but rather would complement it as petroleum alone could not meet the huge energy need of the country, more so when the crude oil and gas would get exhausted someday.
“We can produce crude and fire gas, but ultimately, the only way to sustainably reach every nook and cranny and every citizen of our country with some level of power supply is to look towards natural sources such as solar, wind, and water resources. Solar used to be very expensive but the cost is dramatically coming down”, he said.