Pertamina to start selling mini LPG containers in September

State oil and gas company PT Pertamina will sell liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) in 3 kilogram containers at a cost of Rp 132,000 starting from September 2006. During the initial stage, the company will sell LPG in mini containers in Jakarta as part of a government program to push households to switch from subsidized kerosene.

Pertamina?s director of trade and marketing Achmad Faisal wants to convince consumers that the use of LPG will be more cheaper and economical compared to kerosene.

With a price of Rp 4,250 per kilogram, consumers will pay only Rp 12,759 per containers or relatively more cheaper than kerosene because the usage of 1 kilogram LPG is equivalent the of usage of 1.75 liters kerosene, whose price is around Rp 4,375 per liter.

?Moreover, if we see from the performance of kerosene stove it is costly and it wastes lot of heat, ?Achmad said during the sidelines of a President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono?s visit to Pertamina?s headquarters in Jakarta on Wednesday.

But Pertamina is not in a mood to sell LPG on a big scale because there is not yet an agreement on the subsidy amount with the government. Currently, it has prepared just 1,300 mini LPG containers.

The government has said that Pertamina needed to procure at least 121 million 3-kg LPG containers to support its ambitious program to replace heavily subsidized kerosene with LPG. (godang)