Kenya’s journey towards reducing the price of liquefied petroleum gas is coming ever closer to accomplishment.
This comes as Lake Gas Ltd, whose new storage facility in Vipingo, Kilifi county, prepares to receive its first vessel, expected to bring in 12,000 tonnes of LPG, in about two weeks.
The facility, which has so far cost Lake Gas $80 million (about Sh10.4 billion), has a storage capacity of 10,000 tonnes of LPG and is already in the second phase of establishing more storage space that will accommodate a further 15,000 tonnes of LPG.
“In the end, this facility will have 25,000 tonnes storage capacity of LPG, which will go a long way in ensuring security of supply of LPG to the people of this country," Energy CS Opiyo Wandayi said.
“And of course that will translate into reducing the ultimate cost of this product to wananchi themselves.”
He spoke in Vipingo, Kilifi county, on Saturday when he conducted a site visit to assess the preparedness of the Lake Gas facility for the arrival of their first vessel carrying LPG gas.
CS Wandayi said the facility is in line with the government’s LPG Growth Strategy, which was approved by the Cabinet two years ago.
This, the CS said, is to expand the capacity of the infrastructure in the country to bring in more LPG for its uptake to advance.
“We still have vast potential for the uptake of LPG in this country. That is also in line with our commitment under the Paris Agreement in as far as climate change is concerned," Wandayi said.
“We are moving steadily towards green energy and this LPG provides us with a very good opportunity to enhance our movement towards that direction.”
This will also go a long way to reducing the price of LPG in the country to reasonable amounts, he reiterated.
“As it is, the cost of LPG is beyond anybody’s reach in this country and therefore it makes it very difficult for the common person to afford it,” Wandayi said.
He said once the government liberalises the space and provides the necessary support and enabling environment for investors to bring in more LPG, the cost issue will be addressed.
Wandayi said the government will allow fair competition to thrive, and will protect investors and their investment from internal and external forces that may want to derail the investments.
“Our ultimate objective is to ensure the price of LPG reduces because we believe strongly that currently LPG is overpriced in this country,” the CS said.
“Our nation’s journey towards 100 per cent transition to clean energy by 2030 is on. The government’s growth strategy is to increase national LPG consumption per capita from 7.5kg/yr in 2021 to 15kg/yr by 2030.”
Governor Gideon Mung’aro said, in jest, Kilifi will be the first and biggest beneficiary of reduced gas prices.
He said in Kilifi, they are also creating an enabling environment for more investors.
The investors, he said, must also strictly follow the rules and regulations of the national and county governments to benefit residents more.
“And although I know there are some level of skills required that may not be available in Kilifi, I would like to inform the investors that our youth are trainable,” he said.
Kilifi is attracting more investors not only in the oil subsector but in other subsectors too.
Already, more than 200 different investors from across the globe have shown interest in investing in Kilifi.
Petroleum PS Mohamed Liban said the LPG Growth Strategy that was passed by Cabinet almost two years ago has five pillars, one of which is infrastructure development.
He said this will require concerted efforts among stakeholders.
“If AGOL [African Gas and Oil Company Ltd] have 25,000 tonnes of LPG storage, Lake Gas has 10,000 tonnes, that is 35,000 tonnes, KPRL [Kenya Petroleum Refinery Limited] has its own just as GAPCO,” Liban said.
“So, if we involve all these, we can harness all these efforts together and come up with a common user facility to empower the local capacity.”
Lake Gas supply and operation manager Morris Mutiso said the establishment of the facility started towards the end of 2022 and is now complete.
It will provide direct permanent jobs to about 60 residents directly, and 1,000 others indirectly.
