Ghana’s Vice President, Dr Mahamudu Bawumia, says significant progress has been made towards the pilot implementation of the Cylinder Recirculation Model under the National Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) Promotion Policy.
He said the Policy sought to ensure that LPG consumers have access to safe, efficient, affordable and environmentally-friendly LPG for commercial, industrial and domestic use by 2030.
The National Petroleum Authority (NPA) says the Ghana Cylinder Manufacturing Company is producing 37,000 cylinders needed for the pilot project in October this year, in Obuasi in the Ashanti Region and Kwaebibirim in the Denkyemboa District of the Eastern Region.
Dr Bawumia assured of government’s commitment to continue implementing policies and programmes to protect the safety and interests of Ghanaians.
Vice President Bawumia announced this at the opening of the third edition of the Ghana International Petroleum Conference (GhipCon) in Accra on Wednesday, held on the theme,” Regional Collaboration: A Catalyst for Transformation”.
The conference was organised by the Ministry of Energy and National Petroleum Authority in collaboration with the Chamber of Bulk Oil Distributors, which attracted petroleum experts, policy-makers, business men and women and captains of industry in the sub-region.
It is designed to actively bring to the fore the operating industry’s perspectives and guidance on issues of governmental and regulatory policy as well as best practices for the advancement of the petroleum downstream sector across the West African sub-region.
It will also afford stakeholders in the petroleum downstream industry in West African sub-region, to harmonise their policies and explore opportunities to allow the industry to respond to global development and trends consistent with member countries’ interests and aid in their economic transformation.
Some topics outlined for discussion include; Unlocking West Africa’s Deregulatory Inertia, Making West Africa’s Refineries Work, Ghana’s Cylinder Recirculation Model, Harmonising Sub-regional Petroleum Products Specifications and Challenges of Regional Distribution of Petroleum Products.
The Vice President said government was in the process of ensuring institutional and regulatory re-alignment of the midstream gas sub-sector to bring clarity and a degree of certainty to players in the industry.
In that regard, he said, the Energy Minister would soon finalise re-alignment and commence legislative consolidation of the Gas Master Plan into a Gas Act, which was an important requirement for development of Ghana into a petrochemical hub in the West African sub-region.
He said the proposed Gas Act would provide an enabling environment and appropriate incentives for investors and assured of government’s resolve to make the security of gas supply as feedstock for petrochemical plans a priority.
He said procurement of natural gas from domestic sources had been secured under regulation governing domestic supply obligation of upstream gas producers.