Arising from a meeting with high-volume suppliers of petroleum products on Tuesday, May 14, the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) said there will be a new requirement for Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) petrol stations to have the Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) points of sale.
This is to align with President Bola Tinubu’s CNG initiative and also make the CNG available to Nigerians.
The Authority, Chief Executive, Engr. Farouk Ahmed broke the news to reporters in Abuja.
“We will require that CNG add on to be put in point of the petrol stations. And the new applications will be one of the requirements that you must have a CNG add-on in your petrol station,” he said.
He appealed to partners in the industry to invest in the business to ensure that there are points of sale of CNG available to consumers.
According to him, as soon as the Authority is through with engagements and deliberations with the stakeholders for an alignment with the decision, there will be the rollout of this regulation.
Ahmed said, “Plans for CNG: You heard what Mr. President said yesterday that all government agencies, ministries and departments are to patronize or refocus their mobility on the CNG power.
“What we are saying from NMDPRA is to make it available to the consumers, we are appealing to our partners in the industry to also invest in ensuring that that point of sale is available to the consumers.
“By so doing we are going to roll out once we finish our engagement and discussions with them, we align,” he added.
The Authority Chief Executive also revealed that the meeting also discussed the requirement for petrol stations to have trackers which monitor their consumption.
This, according to him, is to ascertain the actual national consumption volume figure in the country.
He disclosed that the industry now wants to move from simply relying on trucking figures to actual consumption volume figures.
Ahmed said: “We also talked about our National Consumption: the requirement for petrol stations or retail outlets and the trucking industry to put some trackers that monitor the movement of the product as well as the dispensing and accounting for the volume sold or the volume transported so that we can have a very good estimate of our actual consumption.
“Because currently what we do, we rely heavily on the trucking rather on than on the actual delivery into retail outlets or other consumption areas.”
He said one of the other issues that is of concern to marketers is the ability to import petroleum products especially diesel and ATK, which is Aviation Turbine Kerosene or Jet kero in the advent of the new refinery that came on stream that is the Dangote Refinery.
Ahmed noted that it is a commercial decision for Dangote Refinery to sell its products at any price, based on market forces, adding that it is also the decision of the marketers to patronize him or not.
The Authority Chief Executive said the primary concern of the NMDPRA is to ensure an adequate supply of products and to bridge the supply gap.
He, however, appealed to patronize the indigenous firm, which is a major achievement in the country which has been importing virtually all its petroleum products.
Ahmed said, “And we allayed all the fears of the marketers that Dangote Refinery is a major achievement in our country because in the past we were importing every litre of petroleum product that we required except those supplied by modular refineries.
“And as oil producing country, we believe NMDPRA that we should support our local industries and that is why we encouraged our marketers to patronize our local industry. At the same time, it is a commercial decision that they have to make themselves between the supplier and the consumers or the marketers or the client.
“NMDPRA will not determine how much is sold, the price you are selling and the price you are buying but just like any other market, it is a matter of supply and demand. It is your own decision to go to Dangote Refinery and purchase or for Dangote Refinery to determine the price they sell.
“But we as the regulator are only interested in ensuring that the nation is well supplied to prevent any supply gap,” he reiterated.