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Reatile Gaz launches new E Cape LPG storage, distribution facility

Photo by Duane Daws

Reatile Gaz chairperson Simphiwe Mehlomakulu

Photo by Duane Daws

11th September 2014

By: Leandi Kolver

Creamer Media Deputy Editor

  

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Encouraged by the industrial and tourism potential of Port Elizabeth and driven by its partnership with gas company Air Products, liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) supplier and distributer Reatile Gaz on Thursday officially opened a new LPG depot and cylinder filling facility in Nelson Mandela Bay.

The newly built facility, with an initial storage capacity of 45 000 ℓ and the capacity to fill about 400 cylinders during an eight-hour shift, would act as a distribution facility, supplying cylinders directly to customers, while also offering back-up bulk storage facilities.

Reatile Gaz would initially distribute about 75 t/m of LPG, but would increase this to 150 t/m over the next 18 months, Reatile Gaz GM Roger Rudd told Engineering News Online.

He added that distribution from the facility had already started with about 7 t of LPG distributed over the past week.

Currently, the Port Elizabeth facility employed eight people, with the potential to increase employee numbers as the plant became more established.

Speaking at the opening ceremony, Reatile Gaz chairperson Simphiwe Mehlomakulu commented that the company had been encouraged by the positive economic growth prospects in the Eastern Cape, and specifically in Nelson Mandela Bay.

“Developing the gas supply market within a growing region makes business sense,” he noted.

He added that through Reatile Gaz’s partnership with Air Products – having acquired its LPG business in 2009 and being the exclusive supplier and distributer of LPG to Air Products and its customers – the company’s expansion plans were fast-tracked, especially in light of Air Products’ new air separation unit in the Coega industrial development zone, which would be commissioned in the fourth quarter of this year.

Air Products South Africa GM Josua le Roux said there was growing demand for the reliable supply of LPG and, through Air Products’ partnership with Reatile Gaz, it was looking to bring long-term security of supply to the Eastern Cape region.

“New levels of security of supply will unlock economic and social potential in the region,” he noted.

Meanwhile, Rudd said the company hoped to, in the longer term, add another 800 000 ℓ of additional capacity to the Port Elizabeth facility, which would allow Reatile Gaz to rail LPG to the plant where it could then be decanted and distributed on a larger scale.

He noted that this potential expansion had been taken into consideration when Reatile Gaz bought the property and, therefore, there was space on the existing premises to accommodate the expansion.

In addition to the newly established Port Elizabeth facility Reatile Gaz, a division of broad-based black economic-empowerment company Reatile Group, also had storage and distribution facilities in Gauteng, the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal.

Rudd pointed out that Reatile Gaz was already building another storage and distribution facility in Hammarsdale, Durban, and was in negotiations to acquire land in East London and Bloemfontein for another two facilities.

Mehlomakulu said that, as the country continued to face significant electricity challenges, Reatile Gaz believed the wider use of LPG could lessen the energy burden placed on State-owned power utility Eskom.

However, he noted that affordability, as the gas had to go through a refinery to be produced, was still a major issue in terms of promoting the wider use of LPG.

“That is why government must include LPG in the basic free energy subsidy,” he stated, adding that this would enable poorer households to use the gas more freely.

Edited by Chanel de Bruyn
Creamer Media Senior Deputy Editor Online

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