740 Gas Centres, 20m Cylinders to be Deployed Across Nigeria Says NNPC
The Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited has announced that it will deploy 740 cooking gas distribution centers, 37 filling plants and skids at 541 stations across the country.
It also stated that it was working with the Office of the Vice President to establish a gas funding company to inject 20 million cylinders into the Liquefied Petroleum Gas (cooking gas) market in order to deepen the use of LPG in Nigeria.
NNPC’s Group Chief Executive Officer, Mele Kyari, disclosed this at the India-Nigeria LPG Summit Abuja 2022, with the theme, “Energising the Future: Leveraging the Indian Experience to Achieve Nigerian National LPG Aspiration.”
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The hybrid event, hosted by NNPC Limited with support of the Office of the Vice President and World LPG Association, witnessed bilateral exchanges to foster mutual collaboration and provide opportunities for the Nigerian LPG industry to learn from India’s experience. India is one of world’s most successful nations with respect to LPG penetration.
Kyari told the global audience at the event that Nigeria had identified its abundant gas resources as fuel for energy transition, which informed the country’s net zero commitments by 2060 and the declaration of 2021 – 2030 as the Decade of Gas.
“Accordingly, NNPC Limited is positioned to deploy 740 LPG micro-distribution centres, 37 filling plants and skids in its 541 stations within the next three years,” the oil company’s boss stated.
He added, “NNPC is also collaborating with the Office of the Vice President and other stakeholders on establishment of Gas Funding Company Limited for the injection of 20 million cylinders in the next five years under the Marketer Cylinder Owned Model.”
He said the oil firm had developed new investments in gas, power, and renewables, noting that key pipeline projects such as ELPS II, OB3 and AKK meant to deliver a total of 6.2 billion cubic feet of gas per day were at various stages of completion.
“We have strong presence in the LPG value chain contributing about 45 per cent of domestic supply via joint venture (Oso Bonny River Terminal), affiliates (Nigeria LNG Ltd & Ashtavinayak Hydrocarbon Ltd) and subsidiaries (NPDC),” Kyari told the virtual and physical audience.
He noted, “The NNPC Limited is fully aligned with the Federal Government of Nigeria’s National Gas Expansion Programme and National LPG Expansion Plan initiatives and has a full-fledged LPG business unit established to commercially drive the national LPG penetration.
On expectations from the summit, Kyari said it would discuss the Nigerian experience and Indian example covering safe LPG handling, pricing and financial support to enhance LPG affordability among the poor, communication strategies, ICT and infrastructure, as well collaboration on cylinder management and manufacturing.
He added that “At the end of discussions, the summit will be required to submit a report detailing gaps identified and recommendations on best practices from the Indian experience for adoption in Nigeria by relevant stakeholders to achieve rapid national LPG penetration”.
