Abstract
This study investigates the effect of gas flaring on human wellbeing and environment in Obodo-ugwa, Ndokwa West LGA, Delta State. The study used primary and secondary source of data. Water samples from wells, river and boreholes and soil samples were collected and analyzed using standard procedure. Landsat images for the years 2003, 2013 and 2023 were obtained from United States Geological Survey (USGS) online resources to assess the impact of oil spill on biodiversity (vegetation) using the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) in ARCGIS 10.6. The study administered 232 copies of questionnaires to compliment the data. The result of the findings revealed that the mean surface water (river) turbidity 16.00 NTU was 11.5% above the NSDWQ standard of 5.0., while the DO was 3.3% higher than the NSDWQ standard. The Biological Oxygen Demand (BOD) for Well water (A and B), borehole, and the river water were 9.8mg/L (96%), 9.9mg/L (98%), 7.7mg/L (54%) and 10.2mg/L (104%) higher than the Nigeria Standard for Drinking Water Quality (NSDWQ) and World Health Organization (WHO) Standard. For Chemical Oxygen Demand (COD), all water sources were above both the WHODWQ and NSDWQ. The soil analysis revealed manganese 4.53mg/kg (7.60%) above the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) limits of 4.21kg/kg, copper 7.60mg/kg (111.11%) above the 3.60mg/kg FAO limit. The NDVI result shows 80% deterioration vegetation health including farm land as only patches of healthy vegetation on the periphery as evident from 2003, 2013 and 2023 where the highest greenness index ranged from 0.26 to 0.34 in 2023, indicating that over the period of study, the forest in these areas have been degraded to mere shrubs. The study recommend that the Federal Government should enforce existing laws and provide alternative energy source to mitigate the effect of gas flaring on the people and salvage the environment.
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