Founded in 1973 as one of the federal research institutes the Gowon administration commissioned for technological self-reliance, the Projects Development Institute (PRODA), Enugu holds the federal mandate for industrial-process design and ceramics. Its coal programme, anchored on the Enugu and Okaba sub-bituminous coalfields, ran characterisation, gasification, and Fischer-Tropsch-pathway laboratory work for the conversion of Nigerian coal into liquid fuels.
Pilot-scale fixed-bed gasifier work was completed by the early 1980s. Bench-scale syngas-to-methanol and syngas-to-Fischer-Tropsch-diesel runs were reported in the *Nigerian Journal of Engineering* through the 1980s. The eastern coalfield was characterised in detail; conversion ratios and ash content were within the range that, with capital investment, would have made commercial CTL viable.
Capital investment did not arrive. Nigeria's coal industry, run by the Nigerian Coal Corporation (which from 1973 was a vehicle of asset decay rather than production), collapsed alongside the railways that had moved the coal to Lagos. The 2003 NCC privatisation produced no operating mines. PRODA's coal work remained on the shelf.
Renewed Chinese and Indian interest in coal-bed methane and coal-to-liquids since 2010 has prompted intermittent revivals; no plant has been built.