The Federal Government, through the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR), has directed 9,000 filling stations in the country to commence the installation of facilities for the supply of alternative fuels. The Director of DPR, Sarki Auwalu, said the agency issued the directive to deepen the utilisation of LPG, CNG and LNG as alternative fuels for Nigerians.

Auwalu said this is in furtherance of the Federal Government’s National Gas Expansion Programme, NGEP, promoted by the Ministry of Petroleum Resources, which seeks to encourage increased gas usage; serve as a cheaper and cleaner alternative to petrol for transportation, with the introduction of Autogas.

He said the DPR had carried out nationwide audit of all retail outlets and categorised them into three – categories one, two and three – with a view to ascertain readiness for deployment of add-on facilities.

According to him, about 9,000 service station, which represents 27% of the total number of retails outlets in the country, are in category one and have been identified as suitable for immediate integration of add-on facilities based on robust safety assessment and technical considerations by the DPR.

He said the department had directed that all category one retail outlet operators should commence immediate installation of modular add-on facilities or full-scale stand-alone plants and update their DPR operating licences accordingly.

“The DPR has also approved the deployment of skid-mounted modularised/containerised Autogas systems and other intrinsically safe systems for gas storage to promote affordability, accessibility, and availability of the products.”

The selected filling stations will start dispensing Autogas and natural gas by the end of September 2020. For more information, please visit this link.

16 September 2020