Nigeria’s Weak Regulatory Framework around Oil Spills infringe on SDG 13-15

• Oil refineries have continued to contribute to environmental degradation for close to a decade;

• Regulatory framework cede power to oil refineries, instead of oil spill regulatory agencies;

• Pending Petroleum Industry Bill still fails to address some regulatory challenges concerning oil exploration;

• In all, occurrences show Nigeria is miles off completing Sustainable Development Goals 13-15.

The double-edged sword that is crude oil, while responsible for Nigeria becoming Africa’s largest economy, is also responsible for countless jobs lost, and a continual environmental degradation. 

Economists have regarded Nigeria as a one-product economy. Crude being the product is responsible for most of the successes Africa’s largest economy has enjoyed in several decades. But with this success came the environmental decadence in oil-producing communities resulting from the government’s negligence in cleaning up oil spillage. The product being abandoned lands, leading to impoverished lives.

Worse still, the trend of oil spillage is not novel. In some communities in the Niger Delta, Rivers, and Bayelsa, it is now impossible for people to go down the creeks to fish or swim because of crude present in streams and rivers. Even worse, the once prominent fish trading community no longer have seafood available for even family consumption. 

And as for the main culprits, major oil refineries such as the Shell, Nigerian Agip Oil Company, National Petroleum Development Company, Aiteo Exploration and Production, Eroton Exploration and Production Limited, and Heritage Energy Operational Service Limited have contributed to environmental disaster.

History of oil incidents and spillage from 2015-2021

What causes oil spillage?

There are numerous causes to oil spillage such as tankers, barges, pipelines, refineries, drilling rigs, and storage facilities. But according to the Chevron and Nigerian oil Spill Monitor report, 80% of oil spill incidents are sabotage, and 20% operational malfunction on land and ocean. 

One research went further to show how oil refineries’ staff intentionally cause oil spills to manipulate cost for their profit. And following calls for cleanup, they alter the costs and community compensation figures for their benefit. Similarly, residents also sabotage pipelines to resell the oil for-profit. Regardless of the means, these disruptions create a cycle of environmental deterioration.

How Oil Spills Affect the Economy

For the past six years, our Nigerian refineries have continually lost 188566.2 barrels of oil, which is approximately $8.496 bn to waste, costing residents’ lives without adequate compensation. 

Datphyte observes some of these costs in relegated jobs or livelihoods. For instance, in Rivers State, once home to rich hydro-vegetation,  oil spills threaten residents’ welfare. In essence, oil spills render farmlands uninhabitable and poison aquatic life, laying off farmers and fishers alike. 

Worse still, these rural communities live hand to mouth, relying on proceeds from subsistence living. But when such a livelihood is disrupted, without adequate compensation, residents are left stranded. Consequences range from out of school children, to displaced residents and everything in between. A corollary economic effect is less revenue remitted to the government. 

On a global scale, Nigeria’s improprieties with oil spill further hinder Sustainable Development Goals 13-15. While the United Nations noted an improvement in the adoption of 2015 SDGs concerning reduced maternal mortality rates, health and gender, environmental safety is still wanting. 

How Oil Spill affects the Ecosystem

Besides the glaring effects on residents’ welfare in oil-producing communities, oil spillage poses far more danger to the environment. A cursory look into the environmental degradation further reveals threats posed to our ecosystem. Research has shown oil spillage affects aquatic life, blocking the sunlight from reaching the bottom layer, causing fishes to become biodegradable; and by implication, unfit for consumption. 

Its effects are more evident on land, poisoning soils and killing herbivores that feed on plants. In the same vein, residents who feed on livestock suffer chronic disease. A result of animals who fed on affected soil. Worse, though, when these animals die, they release toxins into the atmosphere, particularly Sulphur IV oxide and Lead II oxide, which causes respiratory difficulties. 

Mr Agbo Chinonso Bathlomeo, a Climate and Environment specialist, reveals that the oil spill damages the ecosystem’s biotic components at every oil split on the land or ocean. It pollutes the entire ecosystem by disrupting the livelihoods of the Endoca population. The direct effect of an oil spill on climate change is due to all vegetation types’ death.

Faulty regulatory practices: oil refineries, not oil agencies call the shots

According to the Oil Spillage/ Notification Reporting Format, the Environmental Guidelines and Standards for the Petroleum Industry in Nigeria (EGASPIN) provides all crude oil/chemical/oil products spillages. It then conveys this intel to the Director of Petroleum Resources (Department of Petroleum Resources). And by implication, the DPR lies at the forefront of the response to oil spills and allows it to coordinate oil spills’ response. 

The DPR further established the National Oil Spill Detection Response Agency (NOSDRA) as the first response for every oil spill reported. Assisting NOSDRA is the National Oil Pollution Management Agency, credited by DPR to manage oil spill in a polluted area and take necessary measures for safeguarding lives.

In reality, however, faulty operationalism hinders the normal functioning of this reporting system. And for Ayobami Olaniyan, these oil agencies do not call the shots. He outlined these improprieties in a paper for the Afe Babalola University Journal Of Sustainable Development Law and Policy.

According to the study, the regulatory agencies, DPR, NOSDRA and NOPMA rely on intel from oil refineries to operate. Oil refineries, on the other hand, often boycott this process to save money. Instead, they investigate spills with their staff; this cuts costs and skips the reporting process. Consequently, regulatory agencies are left in the dark, likewise, the public, who are none the wiser to oil spilt. 

Loopholes in the upcoming Petroleum Industry Bill

Even the upcoming Petroleum Industry Bill does not address some of these regulatory challenges. First, there is no real sanction for offenders who fail to provide an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) form following exploration per Section 283 of the Bill. 

What is more? Actions from oil agencies are tied to the EIA; they cannot respond to possible oil-related incidents without it. So, why then is there no sanction for erring refineries? 

IUCN and Expert proffer solution

The International Union for Conservation of Nature maintained that oil refineries recognise the existing government as a first response, and avoid taking the law into their hands.

In the same vein, the agency charged refineries in cleaning spills, to employ labour-intensive remediation technologies. The rationale is akin to a break-even approach; creating employment opportunities for focus groups (such as youths and women) whose livelihoods exploration activities, threatened.

For Mr Praize Uke, “prevention is better than cure.” To that end, the Agriculture Expert suggested that oil refineries reevaluate their exploration process, with security in mind to prevent oil sabotage. In his opinion, no remedial initiative is better than avoiding instances of oil spills.