The Presidential Compressed Natural Gas Initiative (P-CNGi) says the federal government is working to enable over one million vehicles powered by CNG.

In May, Michael Oluwagbemi, P-CNGi chief executive officer (CEO), said Nigeria would save about $2.5 billion yearly from every one million vehicles powered by CNG.

Oluwagbemi said CNG adoption would also reduce the pressure on foreign reserves and improve the value of the naira.

Showing journalists some CNG conversion workshops in Abuja on Friday, Omo Imoukhuede, P-CNGi operations manager, said the initiative has been “very strategic” in rolling out the conversion process.

Imoukhuede said though a number of conversion workshops have been set up in Abuja, other parts of the country would soon have them.

“We are starting with Abuja and we will be rolling out in other states across the federation,” he said.

“Hopefully and as you can see, work is ongoing, the task will be accomplished.”

Sunday Ayoola, assistant manager NIPCO CNG station, allayed the fears of the cylinders in the cars.

Ayoola said the system would allow vehicles use both petrol and CNG without any hitches.

He said the conversion costs about N4,000 to fill the cylinder at N200/standard cubic meter, adding that with a full cylinder, the vehicle could cover more than 100 kilometres.

“Natural gas is lighter than and once it escapes from the cylinder it goes up above air making sure that there is no spool around unlike petrol,” he said.

“When there is leakage of petrol it creates a spool within the vehicle and any slight source of ignition, the vehicle is ignited.”

Ayoola said this is not so with natural gas, which is safer when compared to petrol.