The Energy and Petroleum Regulatory Authority (Epra) has stopped issuing permits to operators of gas re-filling plants without closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras amid a renewed crackdown on rogue dealers in the industry.
Epra says it has adopted the use of CCTV cameras to monitor liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) operations amid complaints from big oil marketers that rogue operators have been re-filling their gas cylinders illegally, stealing their customers.
Ideally, gas cylinders owned by a company should be returned to the company for re-filling but many LPG re-filling plants re-fill all cylinders brought to them, irrespective of who owns them.
Mr Edward Kinyua, director of Petroleum and Gas at Epra said installation of CCTV cameras is now a permit requirement for LPG-refill plants.
“The DG (Epra Director General Daniel Kiptoo) wrote us a memo, there’s nobody who is getting a license without having access to their CCTVs, whether it’s new or renewal so that we can log into your cameras, and see what you are doing and if you switch those cameras off then we know you are doing funny things,” he said.
Kenya’s LPG consumption per capita fell from eight kilogrammes in 2022 to 6.8 kilogrammes in 2023, trailing several other African countries.
The Petroleum Institute of East Africa (PIEA) said that investment into the LPG business has been hit by rogue traders who hijack cylinders from the market for use at illegal refill outlets.
“There is nobody bringing LPG to Kenyans because nobody is investing. We are doing the business of looking for a cylinder that was bought by ‘A’ filling it and selling it. We are all chasing the same number of cylinders that were there within the ecosystem 10 years ago,” PIEA chairman Peter Murungi said.
The institute blames the government for licensing re-filling plants but failing to manage them since most of those re-filling other companies’ cylinders are operating legally.
“They have legal documents to say they can refill gas. From that perspective, they are not illegal. However, what they are doing is illegal by taking somebody else’s cylinder and re-filling it,” Mr Murungi said.
Epra said adopting information and communication technology (ICT) is part of its strategy to combat illegal activities in the LPG sector.
It has revised regulations to help monitor licensed operators and LPG re-filling plant operations are awaiting gazettement of the Attorney-General.
“We are working towards having a control room for ourselves so that we can be able to have visibility of some of these cylinders. You must install CCTV in your filling plant and we must have access to those CCTV footages,” Mr Kinyua said.
The crackdown follows concerns that while some operators have invested in only 5,000 cylinders, they have been re-filling high numbers of cylinders, thereby stealing the business of competitors who have invested heavily in cylinders.
Epra hopes that through the visibility of operations of re-filling plants, it will be able to combat operators who have been illegally re-filling other companies’ cylinders.