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These are all non-renewable resources whose supply will ultimately be exhausted. [1]. Oil is probably the most convenient fuel and thirty years ago it accounted ...
International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 5, Special Issue 2, April 2015)

The Environmental and Cost Implication of Fossil Fuel Generators: New Benin Market, Benin City, Nigeria Omoruyi, S.O1, Idiata, D.J2 1

Department of Electrical & Electronic Engineering 2 Department of Civil Engineering Edo State Institute of Technology & Management Usen, P.M.B 1104, Benin City 1 [email protected] Abstract- The world's power demands are expected to rise 60% by 2030. In 2007 there were over 50,000 active coal plants worldwide and this number is expected to grow. In 2004, the International Energy Agency (IEA) estimated that fossil fuels will account for 85% of the energy market by 2030. There is a prevalent use of fossil fuel generators for electric power supply to buildings in Nigeria. The associated environmental, health and social hazards are major concerns to both the users and their neighbours. the research work was carried out in Balogun shopping mall in New Benin marketing, Benin City, Nigeria. The environmental effects are impaired hearing, impairing visibility, deafness, sleeplessness, choking sensation and dizziness as observed from the questionnaires administered. The average cost of running the fossil fueled generators ranges from =N= 6,513 to =N= 32,500 monthly.

Nigerians have suffered for decades from the inadequate electricity service from the government owned monopoly PHCN, the Power Holding Company of Nigeria, commonly known by other names such as 'Please have candle nearby'. Nigeria,

Keywords- Environmental effects; fossil fuel; Electricity; power generation

I.

INTRODUCTION

Over 65% of the world's electrical energy used today is generated by steam turbine generators burning fossil fuels as their source of energy and large scale fossil fuelled plants provide most of the world's base load generating capacity. Fossil fuelled plants use either coal (60%), oil (10%)or gas (30%) in purpose designed combustion chambers to raise steam. These are all non-renewable resources whose supply will ultimately be exhausted. [1]. Oil is probably the most convenient fuel and thirty years ago it accounted for 30% of the consumption but it has mostly been replaced by coal as oil prices have risen faster than the price of coal due to insecurities of supply. At the same time, the premium value of oil for transportation and chemical uses, rather than for just burning it to extract its calorific value, has also been recognised. Nigeria has one of the lowest net electricity generation per capita rates in the world.

Fig 1: showing high tension power lines

Africa's most populous country, produces less grid electricity than the Republic of Ireland. South Africans consume 55 times more energy per head, and Americans 100 times more. Over 50% of Nigeria's 160 million people receive no electricity at all [2]. Nigeria is an energy resource rich country, endowed with abundance of renewable energy (RE) resources, providing her with great capacity to develop an effective national energy plan. However, Nigeria is yet to exploit these huge available energy potentials with less environmental and climatic impacts [3]. Commercial electricity generation in Nigeria currently comes from 7 power stations and various independent Power Projects around the country. Thus, the current nation’s available electricity generating capacity is about 3,920MW with per capita power capacity of 28.57 Watts and this is grossly inadequate even for domestic consumption [4].

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International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 5, Special Issue 2, April 2015)

For Nigeria to meet up its energy needs, it requires per capital power capacity of 1000 Watts or power generating/handling capacity of 140,000 MW as against the current capacity of 3,920 MW. Consequently, availability of power in the country varied from about 27% to 60% of installed capacity, while transmission and distribution losses accounted for about 28% of the electricity generated in the country [5]. The energy consumption mix in Nigeria is dominated by fuel wood (50.45%); petroleum products (41.28%) and hydro electricity (8%). Coal, Nuclear, geothermal, tidal, wind and solar energy are currently not part of Nigeria’s energy mix, as they have either been neglected, not discovered or are currently at their early stage of development (4Omokaro, 2008). The energy utilization pattern in Nigeria can be grouped into industry, transport, commercial, household and agricultural sectors. Fuel wood is used by over 60% of people living in the rural areas and 80% of Nigerians as energy source. Nigeria consumes over 50 million metric tonnes of fuel wood annually, which is a major cause of desertification and erosion in the country [3]. II.

P URPOSE OF T HE STUDY

The lack of a reliable supply and the constant blackouts cause severe economic damage. The cost of alternatives, mainly diesel generation, is at least four times the cost of a reliable power supply. In addition to this direct cost is the negative impact on people's time — this can mean the time spent accessing alternatives, or the time lost because children cannot read in the evenings. The modern world is dependent on access to information, which in turn is only possible with a reliable and constant source of electricity [2]. This paper investigates generator users’ and their perceptions on the environmental hazards and the cost implication of fossil fuel generators used for electric power supply to shops in New Benin Market, Benin City, Nigeria. It was effected mainly by field surveys through the use of a well structured questionnaire. III.

METHODOLOGY

The main area of the market which was investigated is the shopping mall along Upper Mission road. The Balogun shopping mall which contains about 200 locked up shops. Questionnaire was administered to the shops and 150 were returned which gives us a 75% returned rate. The questionnaire mainly addressed the following: a). Frequency of generator usage.

b). Environmental issues in fossil fuel generators operation. c). Generator users’ attitude to neighbours’ complaints. d). Cost of running these generators e). The type of fuel used by the generators IV.

FOSSIL FUELS

Humans need energy for just about any type of function they perform. Houses must be heated, energy is required for industry and agriculture and even within our own bodies a constant flow of energy takes place. All processes that provide us with the luxuries of every day live we can no longer live without require energy generation. This is an industrial process that can be performed using various different sources. These sources can be either renewable or non-renewable. Renewable energy sources are replaced in time and will therefore not run out easily. However, non-renewable energy sources are threatening to run out if our standard of usage becomes too high. Nowadays many renewable energy sources are available for use, for example solar and wind energy and water power. Ironically, we still gain most of our energy from non-renewable energy sources, commonly known as fossil fuels. The non-renewability of these sources will probably cause prices to rise up to a point where they are no longer economically feasible [6]. According to Klazema [7], Though different terms are occasionally used that are interchangeable for each, there are three primary varieties for fossil fuels. These are coal, oil, and natural gas.  Coal Of the three types of fossil fuels, coal is the only one still in a solid state. It appears as chunks of midnight black rock, which are harvested from the Earth by workers in mining operations. Coal is composed of five different elements: carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, hydrogen, and sulfur, with the distributions of those five elements varying depending on the piece of coal.  Oil Oil, also called petroleum, is arguably the most often discussed form of fossil fuel in the world today, with every conversation about vehicular fuel economy and ―arm and a leg‖ gas prices relating back to the near-universal value of this ancient fossil fuel. Just how ancient are most of our world’s petroleum reserves? Over 300 million years, according to scientific consensus. Of those 300 million years, civilizations have been making use of oil for about five or six millennia.

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International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 5, Special Issue 2, April 2015)

 Natural Gas The final variety of fossil fuel is natural gas. Where coal is a solid and oil is a liquid, natural gas is, of course, a gas. It is made up primarily of methane and is incredibly lightweight (as well as incredibly flammable). These two types of fossil fuels simply tend to occur close to one another underground, making mining and harvesting the two resources thankfully efficient once they are found. Unlike oil, though, which is pumped from the ground by massive oil rigs, natural gas is channeled into pipeline. These pipelines take the natural gas to storage facilities, eventually making its way to your home to meet a portion of your energy needs. When we use natural gas for cooking, we often notice a distinctive smell that we associate with the gas. Interestingly, natural gas is odorless when it is mined from beneath the Earth’s surface, with the smell being added later as a means of alerting people to leaks of the substance. V.

Table 3 Showing Generator Users’ Attitude To Neighbours’ Complaints

User Daily Once per week Twice per week Thrice per week

Frequency of use 100 Nil 11 39

Percentage 66.7 0.0 7.3 26.0

Impacts

Frequency

Percentage

Impaired hearing Impaired visibility Deafness Sleeplessness Choking sensation Dizziness

144 74 139 136 141 127

96 49 92.7 90.7 94 84.7

Table 2 reaffirms the fact that the observation of users shows that the impacts of generator on health and the environment is very high with the exception of impaired visibility with 49%. Impaired hearing choking sensation and deafness ranks highest with 96%, 94% and 92.7% respectively.

Indifference

148

Percentag e 98.7

Positive attitude

2

1.3

Table 4 Showing Cost Of Running These Generators

Cost (N)

Mean

Frequency

500 daily and below 500-1000 daily 1000-15000 daily

250.5

15

Percentag e 10

750

129

86

1250

6

4

The economic cost of powering the generators shows that 10% spends an average of =N= 250.5 daily which will translate to =N= 6,513monthly, 86% spends =N=750 which translates to =N= 19,500 monthly and 4% spends =N=1,250 which translates to =N= 32,500 monthly. Table 5 Showing The Type Of Fuel Used By The Generators

The table above shows that the shop owners depends on their generators for electricity supply due to the non provision of electricity by relevant authority’ 66.7% have to power their generator everyday in other to boost their economic activities. Table 2 Showing Environmental Issues In Fossil Fuel Generators Operation

Frequency

The attitude to Generator users’ attitude to neighbours’ complaints shows 98.7% of indifference to complaints as observed from table 3

ANALYSIS AND D ISCUSSION

Table 1 Showing Frequency Of Generator Usage

Attitude

Types

Frequency

Percentage

Diesel

40

26.7

Petrol

110

73.3

The type of fossil power generator predominantly used at the market as observed from is study is petrol driven types with 73.3% while diesel is 26.7%. VI.

ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES ASSOCIATED W ITH F OSSIL FUEL USAGE

Two very important developments on the globe: increased carbon dioxide release into the atmosphere and ozone depletion of the stratosphere, have given much concern to the modern world. Evidence of climatic change in the distant and recent past is pursued both on a world scale and on local scale [8]. At the local scale not less than 84 million Nigerians i.e. 60 percent needs electricity which cannot be serviced by the PHCN (Power Holding Company of Nigeria).

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International Journal of Emerging Technology and Advanced Engineering Website: www.ijetae.com (ISSN 2250-2459, ISO 9001:2008 Certified Journal, Volume 5, Special Issue 2, April 2015)

This population has no option but to depend on petrol or diesel driven generators and considering the fact automobiles also depends on the same source. The attendant environmental effects are summarized [9,10] The world's power demands are expected to rise 60% by 2030. In 2007 there were over 50,000 active coal plants worldwide and this number is expected to grow. In 2004, the International Energy Agency (IEA) estimated that fossil fuels will account for 85% of the energy market by 2030. World organizations and international agencies, like the IEA, are concerned about the environmental impact of burning fossil fuels, and coal in particular. The combustion of coal contributes the most to acid rain and air pollution, and has been connected with global warming. Due to the chemical composition of coal there are difficulties in removing impurities from the solid fuel prior to its combustion. Modern day coal power plants pollute less than older designs due to new "scrubber" technologies that filter the exhaust air in smoke stacks; however emission levels of various pollutants are still on average several times greater than natural gas power plants. In these modern designs, pollution from coal-fired power plants comes from the emission of gases such as carbon dioxide, nitrogen oxides, and sulfur dioxide into the air [11,12,13]. Global death toll from the pollution from fossil fuel burning-based electricity generation. It is estimated that 0.3 million people die annually world-wide from societally-imposed, fossil fuel-based electricity generation pollutants (carbon monoxide, sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, particulates, volatile organics and heavy metals, notably mercury) and 170,000 people die annually world-wide from coal burning-based electricity generation. [14, 15]. International comparisons of fossil fuel-based power pollution deaths. ―Annual coal-based electricity deaths‖ [―total annual fossil fuel-based electricity deaths‖] are 170,000 [283,000] (the World), 11,000 [13,000] (India), 47,000 [47,500] (China), 49,000 [72,000] (the US), 3,400 [6,900] (the UK), 4,900 [5,400] (Australia) and 2,700 [3,800](Canada) as compared to 110 [360] (heavily renewable-based New Zealand) (green-blog.org/2008 and evworld.com). [The total fossil fuel-based deaths are upper limits deriving from a crude assumption, in the absence of readily available data otherwise, of the same mortality from gas burning as from coal burning.

In reality, pollutants (pounds per Billion Btu of energy input) from gas, oil and coal burning are as follows: carbon dioxide (CO2) (117,000, 164,000, 208,000, respectively); carbon monoxide (CO) (40, 33, 208), nitrogen oxides (N2O and NO i.e. NOx) (92, 448, 457); sulphur dioxide (SO2) (1, 1122, 2591); particulates (7, 84, 2744); and Mercury (0.000, 0.007, 0.016) i.e. deaths from gas burning for power may be expected to be lower than for coal burning [16]. VII.

CONCLUSION

There is a prevalent use of fossil fuel generators for electric power supply to market shops in Nigeria. The associated environmental, health and social hazards are major concerns to both the users and their neighbours. There is a willingness to embrace measures (such as regulation of the use, provision of better alternatives and improvement of the supply from the national grid) which would reduce the hazards [17]. The reliable provision of affordable electricity has the potential to tackle both the symptoms and the causes of poverty. Electricity enables hospitals to function more efficiently and people to cook without suffering from wood-smoke pollution. It reduces CO2 emissions by removing the need for highly polluting diesel generators. Most importantly, it would remove the greatest obstacle to doing business in Nigeria and enable manufacturing and other industries to compete internationally. According to the president of the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN), Chief Kola Jamodu, 40% of the production cost of manufacturers goes into the provision of electricity, compared to 5-10% in other similar economies [2]. REFERENCES [1] [2]

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Omokaro O. 2008. Energy Development in a Fossil Fuel Economy: The Nigerian Experience. The report of a National Dialogue to Promote Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency in Nigeria. 55p. [6] Enzier, S.M, http://www.lenntech.com/greenhouse-effect /fossil-fuelshtm#ixzz3R5ifVDmj [7] Klazema, A 2014. Types of Fossil fuel and their uses. June 11. www.udemy.com [8] Agu, A.N 1994 Causes, Effects and Implications of Climatic Change in Nigeria. Global Climate Change Workshop Nigeria, Edited by Engr. Jerome C. Umolu, P.E. Published by Damtech Nigeria, Limited [9] Idiata, D.J; Olubodun, S.O & Ukponmwan, I .2008. The Chemistry of Environmentolgy Effects of Fossil Fuel Usage. Journal of Reserach in Engineering, Vol. 5, No. 4. by International Reserch Development Institute. University of Uyo,Akwa Ibom State. [10] Idiata, D.J; Omoruyi, F.O; Agbonlahor, N.N & Ohonba, S.U. 2007Environmentolgy Effects of Fossil Fuel Usage.The Nigeria Academic Journal, Vol. 13, No. 2 April. Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Akwa. Anambra State.

[11] Camp, C. 2013. Department of Civil Engineering "PCA Manual". University of Memphis, Herff College of Civil Engineering. Retrieved 8 January 2013 [12] Grahame, T., & Schlesinger, R. 2007. Health Effects of Airborne Particulate Matter: Do We Know Enough to Consider Regulating Specific Particle Types or Sources?.Inhalation Toxicology, 19(6–7), 457–481. [13] World Outlook 2004, Paris: IEA, 2004-10-26, p. 31, ISBN 92-64-10817-3, retrieved 2006-06-13 [14] http://green-blog.org/2008/06/14/pollutants-from-coal-based-electric ity-generation-kill-170000-people-annually/ [15] http://www.evworld.com/news.cfm?newsid=8836 [16] Malouf, A and Wimberley, D. 2001.―Health hazards of natural gas‖, Environmental health, 2001. http://www.environmentalhealth.ca/summer01gas.html [17] Mbamali, I, Stanley, A.M and I. K. Zubairu. 2012. Environmental, Health and Social Hazards of Fossil Fuel Electricity Generators: A Users’ Assessment in Kaduna, Nigeria. American International Journal of Contemporary Research, Vol. 2 No. 9.

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