President Muhammadu Buhari will on Dec. 1 roll out the autogas scheme in Abuja as the Federal Government moves to create alternative fuel for automobiles and other prime movers in Nigeria.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Dr Mohammed Ibrahim, Chairman, National Gas Expansion Programme (NGEP), made the announcement at a meeting with media stakeholders on Saturday in Lagos.

Ibrahim said the autogas scheme and deepening domestic utilisation of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) would create about 12.5 million direct and indirect jobs for Nigerians.

He disclosed that cars in the presidential fleet had been converted to run on Premium Motor Spirit (PMS), Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) and Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG).

Ibrahim said the need to switch from PMS (petrol) to gas was necessitated by the deregulation of petrol by the government, which had led to increment in the pump prices in recent times.

According him, gas is a cheaper, safer and cleaner source of energy, hence the need to maximise its utilisation in Nigeria.

Ibrahim said the Department of Petroleum Resources (DPR) had issued new guidelines that were encouraging multi-fuel models for existing filling stations, which would be available nationwide within 30 months.

He said :”We need about 500, 000 conversion engineers in the next 90 days to ensure that the retrofitting of the vehicles go as planned.