A NEW ASSESSMENT AND EVALUATION CRITERIA FOR THE CHOICE OF AN ENERGY RESOURCE IN NIGERIA (RENEWABLE OR NON-RENEWABLE)

Abstract

Energy resources technology is very vital to the economic, social; and political development of any county. Energy is needed both for domestic and industrial purpose and most developing countries such as Nigeria are blessed with abundant energy resources (renewable and/or non-renewable) but the basic problem lies in the lack of technological capability to extract and process these resources to their own benefit, grouped among renewable resources include solar, hydropower, hydro tidal energy, geothermal and biomass, while the non-renewable (depletable) energy, resources include the fossil fuels (coal, crude oil and natural gas nuclear fuels, uranium core or thorium ) and for an energy resource to be economically feasible and viable it must satisfy these techno-economic criteria i. Time frame; ii. Breadth of application; iii. Fuel supply; iv. Environmental effect; v. Safety factor; vi. Social customs; vii. Political factors.