LPG Penetration: FG, Indian Oil Firm, Others to Collaborate on Deployment of 20m Gas Cylinders Nationwide

Emmanuel Addeh in Abuja

The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) and the Indian Oil Company (IOC) are in talks that may see the deployment of about 20 million gas cylinders to enhance the use of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) nationwide in five years.

Speaking at the WLPGA India/Nigeria LPG Summit 2022, in Abuja, the Group Executive Director, Downstream of the NNPCL, Mr Adeyemi Adetunji, explained that the national oil firm was fully aligned with the government’s plan to ensure that there’s more LPG penetration in the country.

At the event themed: “Energising the Future: Leveraging the Indian Experience to Achieve Nigerian National LPG Aspirations,” the NNPCL top official noted that the distribution will be done through about 740 centres.

“The NNPCL is fully aligned with the federal government’s National Gas Expansion Programme (NGEP) and the national LPG expansion plan and has a fully pledged business unit established basically to commercialise the LPG penetration.

“Accordingly, the NNPCL is positioned to deploy 740 LPG micro distribution centres, 37 filling plants in its 541 gas stations within the next three years.

“NNPC is also collaborating with the office of the vice president and other stakeholders for the establishment of gas funding company Ltd for injection of 20 million cylinders in the next five years under the marketer/cylinder owner model.

“It is expected this summit will discuss the Nigerian experience, the Indian example covering LPG handling, pricing and financial support to enhance LPG affordability among the poor, communication strategies ICT and infrastructure as well as collaboration of cylinder management and manufacturing,” he stated.

According to him, the summit will also report on the gaps identified and recommend on best practices from the Indian experience so as to make the Nigerian journey less burdensome.

He added that the recommendation would further help the rapid penetration of the use of LPG in Nigeria.

In his comments, the Indian Oil Company’s Chairman,  Shrikant Madhav Vaidya, said part of India’s target was to facilitate the world LPG associations programme tagged: ‘cooking for life’, which he said  targets 1 billion people using LPG as cooking gas in the next 20 years.

He added: “I’m sure that presence of officials from NNPC, Indian Oil and World LPG association at the summit will enrich the deliberation bordering global LPG penetration.”

According to the Chairman of the WLPGA, LPG remains a transformational fuel which can be used to lift millions out of poverty, pointing out that learning from the Indian experience would eliminate the use of firewood, coal as well as kerosene for cooking by millions of Nigerians.

“Smoking inhaled by women from unclean fuel is equivalent to smoking 400 sticks of cigarettes in an hour, thus ruining their health. Moreover, by releasing LPG connections directly into their homes, it empowers rural women.

“Driven by the inspiring stewardship of the NNPC, the Nigerian energy market is also one of the impressive growth trajectories. Nigeria clocked an impressive 1.7m tones of LPG consumption in 2021 and continues to grow steadily.

“We are at an inflection point in this journey and understanding and implementing the learning from India can have a transformative effect on the Nigeria gold story,” he added.

Experts say that Nigeria requires about $750 million investment in boosting the transportation and retailing infrastructure for LPG in Nigeria, popularly called cooking gas, to achieve the target of 5 million metric tonnes of annual consumption.