Cooking gas: NLNG flood market with 13,000 tonnes

Nigeria Liquefied Natural Gas, NLNG, has said that its vessel has successfully discharged 13,000 tonnes of Liquefied Petroleum Gas, LPG, also known as cooking gas at the Lagos jetty.
This was after some initial delay of its vessel to berth and discharge the commodity at the Apapa ports since December 29, 2016, due to congestion of the port facilities.
According to a statement by its General Manager, External Relations, Kudo Eresia-Eke, NLNG said that the products was discharged over the weekend, while the vessel is scheduled to return to the company’s facility to reload.
According to Eresia-Eke, the NLNG continues its efforts to ensure adequate supply and price stability in the market.
With the successful discharge, the commodity is expected to flood the market in the next couple of days, addressing the scarcity and high cost of the commodity recorded across the country over the last two weeks.
Eresia-Eke had blamed the current scarcity of LPG on recent delays to vessel discharges at the receiving facilities in Apapa, Lagos which are multi-use terminals with berthing priority accorded to vessels discharging other oil products, such as petrol, kerosene and diesel.
He debunked claims that the NLNG is fuelling the hike in the product, stating that the NLNG’s domestic LPG price is based on an international price index plus 50 per cent of the shipping cost of delivering the product to receiving facilities in Apapa-Lagos.
He said, “That price is invoiced in Naira at the prevailing official interbank exchange rates, contrary to erroneous assertions. The reality of this is that although LPG is produced and consumed locally, the product like crude oil, is an internationally traded commodity with an international price benchmark, open to global demand and supply pressures.
“NLNG however softens the impact of price variations by continuing to subsidise the cost of transporting about 40 per cent of total domestic market share which it supplies from its production facility on Bonny Island.”
Continuing, Eresia-Eke said, “Additionally, NLNG continues to work with stakeholders including off-takers and terminal operators, to eliminate bottlenecks and improve operational efficiencies to ensure product availability and help correct market price distortions. We are also engaged with other public and private stakeholders along the domestic market value chain to stimulate price stability and growth.
“NLNG remains fully committed to the goals of ensuring LPG supply availability, reliability and affordability which are key for the development and growth of the Domestic LPG market. It is in this regard that the NLNG Board recently approved an increase in the LPG dedicated for supply into the domestic market from 250,000 metric tons to 350,000 metric tons annually.”