The hotel that was previously using very expensive electric power, from Electrogaz, hopes to significantly trim-down the bills by 30 percent

Serena Hotels in Rwanda, which include both Kigali Serena and Lake Kivu Serena, has switched to the Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) for cooking in a bid to cut their expenditure on electricity. 

LPG is the generic name for mixtures of hydrocarbons (mainly Propane and Butane) in a liquid state. The gas is an excellent fuel for heating, cooking and for automotive use.

Officials at Kigali Serena hotel said that they installed a 10,000 litre capacity LPG tank and that the hotel is already using 80 percent of LPG to meet its cooking needs. They said another tank of the same capacity has been installed at Lake Kivu Serena hotel.

Mugo Maringa, Country Manager Serena Hotels Rwanda told The Business Times in an interview that the company has invested $90,000 to purchase the gas from Kobil, which is the hotels’ current supplier and distributor of LPG.

The hotel was previously using very expensive electric power and it hopes to significantly trim-down the bills by 30 percent.

The hotel management says that Kigali Serena Hotel alone pays a monthly average of Rwf288,340 to Electrogaz for its hydro power bills.

This equates to roughly Rwf34.6 million annually.

Maringa said that as the cost of electricity reduces, the company will transfer the impact to the customers by improving its services.

"The more we save the more we pass it to our customers,” Maringa explained.

The move is also in line with government’s support of promoting the use of LPG cooking gas for households and institutions in order to reduce the consumption of firewood and charcoal, hence condensing the misuse of forests and plantations in the country.

It is said that every year some 5.5 million m3 of wood is used in Rwanda for domestic cooking and heating (including schools and prisons). This represents 90 percent of all firewood consumption in the country.

Industrial use (tea and sugar factories, restaurants, bakeries) is said to be much lower, at some 155,550 m3 per year. The Vision 2020 targets to reduce the volume of wood consumed by 50 percent through efficient use of biomass and alternative sources of fuel.

Government of Rwanda is also supporting the use of LPG cooking gas in order to ensure cleaner environment in the kitchens.

In it’s 2009/10 Budget Framework Paper, government has proposed to reduce taxes on LPG, which is likely to come in place within the coming months if parliament approves.

According to the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning, government will have to forfeit about Rwf300millon of tax revenue in the process of providing fiscal incentives in form of exemptions to alternative sources of energy like LPG.
A number of schools, hospitals and other institutions in Rwanda are looking at changing to LPG to reduce burning of wood.

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