Dr. Emmanuel Onu Egbogah, OON, was a Superhero in petroleum engineering.
He was born on September 14, 1942, in Awka, and attended Central School, Amawbia, before proceeding to the renowned Dennis Memorial Grammar School, Onitsha, in 1957. In 1961, Onu took the Cambridge School Certificate examination and achieved the highest grade (Division 1). In 1963, he enrolled at Friendship University, Moscow, USSR, where he obtained his M.Sc. in Applied Petroleum Geology.
In 1971, he earned a Pre-PhD from McGill University, Montreal, Canada, and another Master’s degree in Petroleum Engineering from the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada, followed by a PhD in Petroleum Reservoir Engineering from the Imperial College of Science & Technology, London.
Dr. Egbogah began his oil and gas industry career in Canada with Philips Petroleum in 1973. He had over 35 years of diverse geological and petroleum engineering experience in Canada, the US, the North Sea, Africa, the Middle East, and the Asia-Pacific region.
He served as Vice President, International Production, at Niko Resources in Calgary. As the technical Adviser and Technology Custodian for Petronas, the Malaysian oil company, he guided the company’s growth from a $5 million enterprise to a $150 million Fortune 500 company and that is why the name Dr E. has opened doors for a lot of people in Malaysia:He also personally developed the Hazira Gas field in Gujarat, India’s only gas field, earning him reverence in India even after his passing.
The petroleum reservoir expert also served as an Adviser for Libya’s national oil corporation. He was a Petroleum Engineering Manager and Enhanced Oil Recovery specialist for Amerigo International in Calgary and Houston, as well as Senior Vice President Engineering with Applied Geosciences and Technology Consultants in Calgary.
In Nigeria, Dr. Egbogah founded Emerald Energy Resources, a prominent exploration and production company in the industry. He was discovered by former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who sought a Nigerian expert to help manage the petroleum industry. Obasanjo found that Egbogah’s reputation was well-known globally, but he was not widely recognized in Nigeria, except by the former Governor of Ondo State, Adefarasin, who had engaged his services to develop the state’s bitumen production.
Obasanjo later met Dr. Egbogah in Europe and offered to make him a minister, but Egbogah declined and accepted an advisory appointment instead. In 2007, he was appointed as Special Adviser to the President of Nigeria on Petroleum Matters and was instrumental in initiating the Petroleum Industry Bill (PIB).
Dr. Egbogah served as a visiting professor to many universities and as an honorary Professor at the Graduate School of Natural Resources Law, Policy and Management, University of Dundee, Scotland, from September 2013 until his passing. He had over 100 technical reports, monographs, and books to his credit.
Dr. Egbogah who held a Chieftaincy title of “Odawaluoji Awka”was one of the pioneer lecturers in Petroleum Engineering at the then Institute of Applied Science and Technology (the forerunner to the Faculty of Technology), University of Ibadan. In 2006, he donated the impressive Centre for Petroleum Engineering at the University of Ibadan, valued at approximately $600,000 at the time. He also provided annual sponsorship of N500,000 to the Society of Petroleum Engineers, Students’ Chapter, and initiated the Emmanuel Egbogah Annual Lecture. The university recognized his contributions by awarding him an Honorary Doctorate of Science degree in 2017.
Dr. Egbogah’s positive impact on engineering education extended to many other Nigerian universities, where he generously endowed programs, including at the University of Port Harcourt, Bells University of Technology, Ota, Federal University of Technology, Owerri, Lagos State University, Ojo, and Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, among others.
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