ANALYSIS OF DECOMMISSIONING AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT OF OFFSHORE OIL AND GAS INSTALLATION UNDER THE PETROLEUM INDUSTRY GOVERNANCE BILL

Nigeria’s economy is largely dependent on the oil and gas industry. The exploration and production of oil and gas mostly require the installation of massive equipment and structures that can be environmentally unfriendly. These oil and gas activities have a high tendency of causing damaging effects to the environment especially during the installation and decommissioning processes.1 The installations used for these activities would be required to be decommissioned at the end of its life span. How the decommissioning is carried out remains a matter of contestation. This is because there are various ways in which it can be done; one of which is leaving the installation in situ, partial removal which both would arguably cause a permanent dent on the environment. On the other hand, there is the complete removal which seems the best approach. It is the view of this work that the installations that are presently in use for the extraction of oil and gas should be completely removed in order to protect the environment and ensure sustainable development. The underlying question for this research is whether the principle of sustainable development is factored in the process of decommissioning. Although Nigeria has recorded various environmental degradation in her search for oil and gas due to oil spills, improper enforcement of its fragmented environmental legislations, lack of transparency in obtaining information and inadequate monetary penalties for violators of environmental laws however, the Nigerian Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB) has captured some elements of sustainable development by introducing provisions aimed at protecting the environment. This research interrogated the provisions of the PIB and other relevant laws on decommissioning and sustainable development. The research recommended in the conclusion that even though the PIB has some elements of sustainable development, it should stipulate a compulsory provision of complete removal of installations and restoring the environment to the state it was prior to oil and gas exploitation and exploration.