Adewale Sanyaolu
NIPCO Plc has said its recent investment in Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), popularly called cooking gas, storage facility will help deepen the use of the product across the country.
Managing Director of the company, Sanjay Teotia, stated this at the 8th annual international conference and exhibition organised by Nigerian Liquefied Petroleum Gas Association (NLPGA) in Abuja.
Sanjay explained that NIPCO in 2017, improved on its storage capacity and other LPG infrastructure in a bid to meet growing LPG stakeholders’ interest and demand from 4,800 metric tonnes (MT) in 2009 to 5,600MT last year.
“We commissioned the biggest LPG single sphere in Africa with a capacity of 5,600MT and increased the loading arms in the gantry to five in a bid to ease loading of trucks for onward distribution of the product to all the nooks and crannies of the country,” Teotia stated.
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He maintained that the investments committed over the years by NIPCO has pushed it to its current position where it now controls a major share of the LPG market with its massive storage facilities and other infrastructure put in place to aid access to the product by the populace.
According to him, the peerless service being provided by the company has made its depot a first choice by many bottling plants and others in the business of LPG.
He added that the improved storage facility and product reception at the terminal has been a major boost in the effective turnaround of LPG vessels berthing at the Apapa jetty.
Throwing his company’s weight behind the Federal Government’s agenda to grow the LPG sub-sector, the NIPCO boss promised continuous and deliberate efforts in supporting government’s genuine desire to make LPG a cooking fuel of choice among Nigerians.
“We diversified in the gas realm in 2009 with the inauguration of a state-of-the-art LPG plant in Lagos with a total storage capacity of 4,800MT spread across three spheres and a three-point loading gantry.
As at the time of its inauguration, it was the biggest LPG storage in the country thus creating veritable avenue to store gas and distribute effectively with the scores of LPG trucks commissioned by the company,” he said.
Asserting the claims of Teotia, Managing Director, Nigeria LNG Limited, Mr. Tony Attah, on a visit to the company’s LPG plant said, “I never, in my wildest imagination, believed that this kind of facility exists in Apapa here.
I can see also very huge investment that NIPCO has put into upscaling the volume of LPG that can be received into the country. For me, that is the real game changer and we are committed to continue to support NIPCO and indeed Nigeria to bring about the positive change in terms of energy availability,” he assured.
Teotia further added that NIPCO as part of its Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) to empower potential LPG users has donated cooking gas accessories including cylinders, hoses and burners, among others, to some communities in Auchi, Edo State; Apapa, Lagos State and some public schools in Lagos.
The feat, according to him, has not only created a lot of awareness on the benefits of gas as domestic cooking fuel but has also served as drawback to deforestation in the country.
“In the realm of creating meaningful access to end users, we have inaugurated several on skid plants at the company’s retail stations across the country. This is aside some dedicated LPG filling stations in some focal markets,’’ he said.