ExpdonaLoaded.blogspot.com (+2348097205188): Expdonaloaded News; WASTE TO WEALTH: Oyo govt launches project to clean up Ibadan

Ibadan metropolis, notorious for being one of the dirtiest cities in Nigeria, appears set not only to drop the unenviable toga, but also to raise wealth from the tons of filth and sleaze that had been the cause of epidemics such as cholera and regular flooding that had led to loss of several lives and property worth millions of naira in the populous capital of Oyo State.
Although the state government had in the last three years invigorated the monthly environmental sanitation that holds every last Saturday of the month and introduced weekly market sanitation every Thursday morning and also empowered the Oyo State Solid Waste Management Authority with vehicles, trash cans, road sweepers, created refuse collection points and other logistics towards ensuring cleanliness of the state, especially Ibadan, the state capital, investigations showed that the refuse had returned to the roads with indiscriminate dumping by residents and inadequate management of waste generated in the city. But the state Governor, Senator Abiola Ajimobi, recently performed a ground-breaking ceremony of the Ajakanga Waste-to-Energy Project in Oluyole Local Government Area of the pace setter state. When completed, the project, sited at the Ajakanga Landfill, will generate five megawatts of electricity and supply stable electricity to the Ajakanga and its surrounding communities, thereby improving their socio-economic status. The project stemmed from the Public- Private-Partnership (PPP) arrangement between the state government and the Highland Energy Services Solutions Limited (HESSL), an international firm in the field. The investment is to be solely financed by HESSL and the project is expected operate and transfer (BOT) and it is also expected that the company will hand over the project to the government or have its management renewed after 25 years of operation. to cost $25 million. It is based on build, “Incidentally, the need for robust solid waste management inadvertently attracted the searchlight of the transformation train itself with the devastating flooding of August 26, 2011, the consequences of which are still fresh in our memory. The report of a committee of eminent professionals set up by my administration to look into the immediate and remote causes of the perennial flooding problem, fingered the solid waste menace as one of the major culprits. “This led to our search for transformative ideas towards taming this monster, especially within the purview of the ongoing, well-received environment transformation programme of the state government. The project is the catch-all deliverable from our efforts in this regard,” Ajimobi said at the inauguration of the scheme. But years before the present initiative, a similar project was launched in the state. It was the Pace Setter Organic Fertilizer Project, conceptually as a waste-to-wealth initiative of solid waste management. It was necessitated to convert to positive use the enormous solid wastes being generated at the densely populated Bodija Market in the heart of Ibadan. The pilot study of the organic fertilizer project was conducted in November, 1997, construction, fabrication and test running of the plant were done in July 1998, the plant was commissioned in July 1998, the plant temporarily collapsed in September 1999 and it was re-commissioned in January 2002. The Oyo State government and Ibadan North Local Government (owner of the market) jointly spent over US $8,000 monthly to dispose of the accumulated waste at the market. The traders associations also engaged the services of Private Refuse Contractors (PRC) to dispose solid wastes at the market without appreciable result. The sanitary condition of the market before the project was a serious threat to the public/environmental health and of serious concern to the government. But the project seemed to have failed. Investigation revealed that the project might have failed based on several factors, including the poor durability of materials used to fabricate machines for the waste treatment plant and ability to withstand the corrosive nature of the waste, retardation of mechanical operations due to the persistent breakdown time, government bureaucracy, and erratic power supply and acute water shortage. As gathered, whenever power outage occurred, the plants shut down until the electricity was restored. The composting process required a lot of water and there was no regular water source. Perhaps, drawing lessons from the cause of the failures of past schemes, the present regime chose to employ a PPP arrangement to ensure commitment rather than a situation whereby public project is seen as “nobody’s project.” Governor Ajimobi hinted at this at the launch of Ajakanga Waste-to-Energy Project in June when he said: “It is on record that successive governments, over the last four decades or so, used to commit huge amounts to public funds on refuse/waste collection within the metropolis. Against the backdrop of several failed attempts, the current administration left no stone unturned in ensuring the viability and sustainability of this venture into the waste-to-energy initiatives. It is anchored on a well-structured public-private-partnership (PPP) arrangement. “The emerging revelations indicate that this single feat may well serve as the major catalyst for the accelerated growth and development of the economy, as well as sustain improvements in the socio-economic well-being of the good people of Oyo State.” The state government would also not be committing its financial resources to solid waste collection in any part of the state soon. The development, it is believed, will free substantial resources for addressing other socio-economic and welfare needs of the people, such as education, health and potable water. A public administrator, Mr. Gbenga Ogunleye, observed that the wastes being generated by the people might soon become “valuable or a sort of gold when they fully understand how municipal waste can be worked upon to produce materials that are beneficial for the use of man.” The government is optimistic that the privatization of solid waste collection will enhance the positive impact of the environmental transformation programme of the state, through sustained environmental cleanliness, and reduction in public health hazards. According to Governor Ajimobi, the project would not fail as sustainable mechanisms have been built into it. “The solid waste collected will be converted and used to generate electricity, the socio-economic benefits of which are limitless. These include accelerated industrialization and the attendant improved employment generation capabilities, enhanced security o lives and property with regular electricity supply, and deepening of e-governance through more intensive use of electricity-driven information and telecommunication technology by both public and private institutions in Oyo State. “This singular initiative will help boost the taxable revenue base of the state, leading to substantial increase in the much-needed internally generated revenue. This project will help open doors to series of private investments, especially into renewable energy sub-sector and allied activities in the state,” he said. To the residents, artisans and operators of grocery shops in Ajakanga and neighbouring communities, the promise of stable electricity for their daily economic activities is good news. They are happy that the project would also provide employment opportunities for them. Managing Director of HESSL, Dr. Akinpelu Shogunle, thanked the government for providing the enabling environment. He was hopeful that the project would put the state at the top of electricity generation, adding that the project would provide 25,000 indirect and 200,000 direct jobs for residents of the area and the state in general. As gathered, the technology that will be utilized by HESSL is designed to convert different types of waste materials in a manner that would reduce risk of groundwater contamination from landfill leachates and emissions from the process, regarded as the cleanest in the industry. General Manager, Oyo State Solid Waste Management Authority, Mr. Joseph Alabi, an engineer, noted that a lot of proposals on waste-to-energy were received and reviewed by the state government before the proposal of HESSL was adjudged credible. He described the project as part of the Integrated Waste Management Facility (IWMF) of the waste-to-energy project. “The firm is a conglomerate of seasoned international contractors that is registered with the Federal Republic of Nigeria and it has seasoned Engineers and financial experts with requisite experience. “The project being part of the Urban Renewal Scheme, will further reduce the expenditure of the state government on management of the landfill site, as well as reduce attendant environmental sanitation and health issues, since the wastes at the landfill sites will be turned into renewable energy,” Alabi said. Researchers have lauded the initiative. They described conversion of solid waste to energy as one of the trusted and popular alternative energy sources used for cooking and lighting in many countries. In a recent research conducted by four professional civil and environmental engineers with the University of Ibadan on ‘Biogas Technology for Nigerian Communities,’ the researchers- M.K.C. Sridhar, Akinwale Coker, Gideon Adeoye, and Ehikilen Aikhomu, revealed that the raw materials needed for the biogas technology were cheap and abundantly available in every community. “Any degradable waste with certain proportion of carbon and nitrogen can generate biogas and the technology does not need sophisticated equipment or tools. Wastes with high organic content, such as animal excreta, human faeces, aquatic weeds and a variety of organically rich industrial wastes are rich sources. It makes sense when such wastes which otherwise contribute to environmental pollution, breeding ground for flies, mosquitoes and other vermin can be converted into useful methane and spent sludge, which is a good organic fertiliser for degraded soils of tropical climate as in Nigeria,” the study says. One of the researchers, Prof. Coker said the study has revealed that biogas was essentially a rural technology and it had the potential to be adapted in urban and peri-urban areas. The developing countries, according to him, can tap from city refuse if they have properly designed sanitary landfills, from where the gas cab be tapped and converted into electricity. “There are examples where relatively cheaper electricity is generated from biogas. In Canada border, the electricity generated from urban wastes is exported to the neighbouring United States for a profit,” he said. Coker, however, noted that the acceptability of biogas in the communities would depend on the availability of the raw material and ease of operation and sustainable generation, adding that the government policy and community participation would go a long way in the success of the viable technology. But what are the advantages and disadvantages of using biogas? Professor Dele Morakinyo, a professional civil and environmental engineer answered the question in his book entitled: Clean Energy Fuels. He explained that biogas is renewable unlike natural gas, because wastes are continuously being generated and energy crops can be planted to augment the generated wastes to provide sufficient volume of biogas. He stated further that biogas is environmentally-friendly as it reduces greenhouses gases, such as methane gas from swamps, landfill sites and sewage treatment facilities, that could have been released directly to the atmosphere are redirected and burnt for power production. It also reduces deforestation resulting from the use of firewoods. Also, the digestate (spent substrate) of biogas can be used as bio-fertilizer to grow crops. Morakinyo said that a drawback for its usage is that, after production, it requires purification for it to become ‘pipeline quality’ renewable natural gas (RNG), and the gas that can be used for cooking, heating, electricity generation or as fuel to run vehicles. The implication of the drawback is additional cost for purification. The impurities, he disclosed, lower the energy value of raw biogas and can cause appliances using biogas to malfunction. If carbon dioxide and water vapour in raw biogas are removed, the methane content can be improved up to 99 per cent. This will make the strength of the biogas to be comparable to that of natural gas from fossil fuel exploration. “Another setback for biogas is that commercial production to match the amount of natural gas from fossil fuels deposit will require a lot of investment. The naturally occurring biogas – landfill gas, is very limited; and biogas generation from additional sources such as animal manure has only been suitable for small scale or family size productions. Large scale production of biogas will, undoubtedly, require cultivation of energy crops in most cases,” Morakinyo said. The Oyo State governor, Senator Ajimobi, has promised that the Ajakanga waste-to-energy initiative would serve as a prototype, as he planned to replicate the project across the numerous dumpsites of the government in the state.