March 21, (THEWILL) – A Non-governmental organisation, Stakeholders Alliance for Corporate Accountability (SACA) has ended a three-day training programme on the effects of gases for officials of the National oil spill detection and Response Agency(NOSDRA) and the Bayelsa State Ministry of Environment.
THEWILL learnt that the programme, funded by Misean Cara of Ireland and St Patrick’s Mission, was a fallout of SACA’s avowed collaboration with government and other stakeholders towards ensuring a safe, healthy and gas-related hazards free environment for field workers in both public and private establishments.
Speaking with journalists shortly after the event, the Executive Director of SACA, Mr Kingsley Ozegbe, described the training as auspicious, adding that the essence of the programme was to learn and train the participants and the general public, as well as to continue to create public awareness of the dangers inherent in gases, including how even the ones considered to be harmless could become hazardous to human life and the environment when not properly used or handled.
“Today, through this training, the participants have also learnt that even gases considered to be non-hazardous could pose hazards. We call on the multinational companies, government and all operators in the public and private sectors to be cautious in their handling and regulating of the oil and gas sector. But, even as citizens, we must also be careful when it comes to doing our jobs because we want to carry out these jobs without exposure to the hazards of gas.
“Already SACA has acquired a device that will help us to monitor the quality of the air and gases in our environment. It is called aeroqual gas monitor,” Ozegbe added.
THEWILL which monitored the programme in Yenagoa, the state capital, reports that an instructor, Mr Ukekwe Charles, identified all gases as having the potential to cause hazards, noting that if not properly handled by operators and regulators in the oil and gas industries, gases poses a serious threat to both human life and the entire ecosystem.
“There is this gas that crawls on and beneath the surface of the earth called hydrogen sulphide. This gas is so dangerous that when an oil spill occurs, while other gases are contained, it crawls on the ground. And so it is hardly controlled and therefore poses even a more serious threat to both human life and the Environment.
“Although we need oxygen to stay alive, t we must also know that too much of oxygen in the environment is hazardous. Oxygen is highly combustible. But in general, all gases are combustible. Gases in an environment could be ascertained through the processes of diffusion, aspiration and physical pumping. Nobody should work in an environment with hazardous gases for more than eight hours,” he noted.
