Obasanjo Tasks FG To Boost Use Of Gas

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo, has urged the Federal Government to promote the use of Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) and Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) in the country.

He said in a bid to promote cleaner environment, the idea why the use of CNG was signed during my tenure as the President in 2006, was to develop gas as a vehicular source of fuel.

According to Obasanjo: “If other governments had promoted the use of LPG and CNG in Nigeria, half of the country’s vehicles would have been converted to gas. The essence is to provide alternative to Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) or petrol at a reduced cost and to boost national socio-economic growth.”

He said that aside the economic gains, CNG targeted reduction of unfriendly automobile emissions and exposure of Nigerians to the innovation of powering vehicles on gas.

The Managing Director, NIPCO Plc, Venkataraman Venkatapathy, said that Nigeria would have saved government over $2 billion yearly, if the use of CNG is promoted in Nigeria. He stated that globally, the natural gas industry was increasing its focus and efforts to support natural gas transport.

He further said that the CNG project was between the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and NIPCO, through a joint-venture scheme called Green Gas Ltd. He explained that the initiative is ushering in a new era of vehicles running on the CNG in Nigeria with its attendant benefits

The managing director said that CNG “is a superior auto fuel alternation to liquid fuels, mainly petrol and diesel specifically for countries like Nigeria which is blessed with abundant availability of natural gas remains untapped”.

According to him, to replace 20 per cent of current petrol consumption of Nigeria, Natural gas required is less than five per cent of the total domestic gas consumed currently and less than one percent of the current gas production.

“This will save the country over $2 billion yearly in foreign exchange. In Benin City, Edo State, over 4,000 vehicles run on CNG which resulted in replacing 20 million litres of petrol from 2012 to 2015 and which also saved over nine million dollars for the country,” he said.

 Venkatapathy stressed that CNG had more benefits than petrol, adding that some of the benefit include low operating costs, lower maintenance costs and it reduces harmful vehicle emissions that cause local air pollution.