Oil firm to let your pocket determine how much gas you buy

By Macharia Kamau

National Oil Corporation has launched a mobile mini LPG filling plant for consumers to buy gas in preferred quantities.

The mini plant is in turn expected to help eliminate illegal refilling of liquefied petroleum gas and increase use of gas, especially among people who have shied away from Liquid Petroleum gas (LPG) because of the cost of regular refilling of an entire gas cylinder.

The facility will allow consumers to buy gas in varying quantities just like petroleum products.

The State-run oil marketers said the facilities will be stationed in middle and low income areas, including Nairobi’s informal settlements, where demand for smaller quantities of LPG has been rising.

Sumayya Hassan-Athmani, the managing director of Nock said the company plans to tap into the informal market, which has been served by illegal refillers.

"We are aware that one of the barriers to wider LPG usage in the country is the initial cost of acquiring the equipment including the cylinders as well as the cost of refilling a full cylinder," she said.

"In our quest to be part of the solution, we are tackling the second issue by giving customers the flexibility of choosing how much gas they would like to buy. Unlike a standard LPG filling plant, our facility is able to fill quantities of even 1kg of LPG into existing cylinders."

She added that the mini LPG plant works on a simple but highly safe technology. The containerised unit is made up of an LPG storage tank, dispenser, filling scales, pump and a leak detector.

Nock says the plant is running on a pilot basis as it prepares to expand the project to the rest of the country. In the long run, it intends to set up several such facilities in various high potential areas around the country.

Apart from the constraint of adequate storage and distribution infrastructure for LPG, the high initial costs of acquiring equipment such as cookers and gas cylinders has also constrained growth of LPG usage.

"To increase usage and penetration of LPG, there is need to provide more fiscal incentives such as cookers which are currently expensive to prospective users," said Athmani.