Senegal-environment-hydrocarbons
Dakar, Apr 17 (APS)-Senegal now has a strategic planning tool in the field of environmental and social management of the exploration and exploitation activities of its oil and gas resources, learned, Thursday, from the Minister of the Environment and the Ecological Transition, Daouda Ngom.
”Through the strategic environmental evaluation study of the Offshore and OnShore petro-gazier sector, our country now has a strategic planning tool in the field of environmental and social management of exploration and exploitation activities of our oil and gas resources ”, he said.
Daouda Ngom intervened during the opening ceremony of the strategic environmental assessment workshop in the petro-gazier sector and the Senegal Marine and Coastal Atlas in Senegal, in the presence of his colleague from Energy, Oil and Mines, Birame Souleye Diop.
” The strategic environmental assessment of the offshore and onshore petro-gazier sector must allow our country to identify the environmental risks and challenges associated with petroleum and gas projects, especially in sensitive sectors such as fishing, tourism, agriculture, ‘he explained.
Daouda Ngom stressed that the clearly expressed choice to engage Senegal in a new era where the exploitation of petroleum and gas resources constitutes an important lever for economic growth and social development, should not hide the ecological cost.
He recalled that the public notoriety that the petroleum and gas industry, in particular, the offshore projects, have major environmental and social risks whose management, requires adequate preparation of all the actors concerned for more vigilance.
“The recent gas leak at the level of the A02 well of the Grand Turtle Ahmeyim gas field (GTA) is a perfect illustration; which is no longer an isolated incident in this critical phase of accelerated commissioning of production facilities but rather an alert to remind us of the environmental emergency situations that threaten our marine and coastal ecosystems as well as the relative socio -economic activities.
Referring to the atlas of the marine and coastal environment, Mr. Ngom stressed that it presents “the reference state of the marine and coastal environment” to facilitate the monitoring of its evolution in a context of oil and gas exploitation, and taking corrective measures in a timely time.
Its development, he said, “responds to the need to identify the multiple and complex challenges of oil and gas exploitation” in relation to “the preservation of marine and coastal biodiversity on which our compatriots depend in the fishing sector, tourism and the maritime economy in general”.
”It is also a tool for helping for the various state services concerned, to better prepare themselves and to adapt their intervention strategies in the event of an incident, in particular the accidental hydrocarbon spills at sea, ” he added, in the presence of several managers of the Ministries of the Environment and Energy.
This strategic study was controlled by an inter -ministerial working group set up by joint decree of the environment and energy departments with the involvement and support of national research universities and centers and the assistance of the project to support the negotiations of petroleum and gas projects executed by GES Petrogaz.
The Minister of Energy, Petroleum and Mines, Birame Souleye Diop, praised the good collaboration of the respective services of the two ministries to lead to this result which he deems “excellent”.
The implementation of these environmental and social management tools reinforce ”the robust measures” that the State of Senegal is carrying out for an oil and gas industry able to benefit the population, without inducing severe damage to its environment and compromising its socio -economic activities, said Diop.
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