Nigeria: Nuclear More Reliable Than Fossil Fuels

Dr. Franklin E. Osaisai is chairman of Nigeria Atomic Energy Commission (NAEC). He says this is the right time for Nigeria to invest in nuclear energy, or risk losing its energy security.

Can you give us the background to the Nigeria atomic energy programme?
The Nigeria Atomic Energy Commission was created and signed into law by military decree in August 1976 by the then Head of State, General Olusegun Obasanjo. Thirty years later, the same man who signed the law remembered it and activated it to pursue the implementation of the programme that utilise nuclear energy for various applications including the generation of electricity.
The mandate of the commission is quite important: to explore and exploit nuclear technology in all its ramifications for the development of this country.
It was provided in the law that the commission should partner with tertiary institutions to train personnel in nuclear technology.
One of the things government did in 1978, two years after the enactment of that particular decree, was the creation of the two centres of excellence. They are sited at the then University of Ife, now Obafemi Awolowo University, and the centre was latter renamed the Centre for Energy Research and Development and the second one is at the Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria, named Centre for Energy Research and Training.
While these centres train quite a number of people, the commission wasn't activated until much later. Also in 1988, the government of former President Ibrahim Babangida decided to set up another nuclear technology centre, the Sheda Science and Technology Complex (SHESCO). Government also decided to create three additional centres - the Centre for Nuclear Research and Training at the University of Maiduguri; the Centre for the Nuclear Studies at the University of Port Harcourt; and the most recent one, Centre for Nuclear Studies and Training at the Federal University of Technology, Owerri.
All the geopolitical zones have one centre each. Beyond that, since we require a lot of human resources, you need to have these centres.
We designed a nuclear power roadmap. That roadmap was accepted and approved by the government on February 7, 2007. In that roadmap, there was a proposal that we have to train 2,000 nuclear scientists and engineers over a period of about 10 years.
How well is NAEC relating with other nuclear centres across the country? Some of them accuse you of cutting down the hazard allowance and denying them some benefits?
We are living in a human society with the tendency that when one or two persons are grumbling, you will hear it everywhere. Remember that the mandate of the commission is to partner with the universities in a way that we develop the human resources' base and capacity of the industry. My mandate as the chairman of the commission is to make sure that we are able to synergise our corporation with these centres, be it at Zaria, Ife or Maiduguri, in a way that we have a government policy to achieve certain results.
The relationship between NAEC and the universities and the centres has been very cordial since 2007.
We operate under government and there are certain conditions approved by government. I want to say that the centres have done better since we took over because we are a focussed organisation. In terms of facilities, we built manpower for them. We are working seriously with the Salaries and Wages Commission to ensure that we have a particular salary scale for people who work in the nuclear sector. First of all, the people are very few and with the type of their training and profession, if you don't maintain them properly, they will go outside the country.
How serious is government about the nuclear energy project?
The utilisation of professionals depends to a large extend on government programmes. Government has identified power generation as a major problem and what we are doing now is realignment within the centres in a way that we begins to produce that cadre of professionals that will fit in. If you don't provide programmes that adequately engage these people, it is either they will be loitering and creating problems or they will go to greener pastures where they are better utilised.
Now we have a graduate training that is taking place in our centre in Sheda; masters degree programmes in nuclear engineering and nuclear science. For the first time in the history of this country, you have the NAEC partnering with four universities. The universities admit the students, we developed the curriculum, approved by their senates and they are all sent to a central place where we teach them all.

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