ISLAMABAD: Special Assistant to Prime Minister Miftah Ismail here on Tuesday said that there will be no load-shedding of gas for domestic consumers and industrial sector during the current winter season.
In an informal discussion with media persons here at Press Information Department, he said that about 1,200 million cubic feet gas will be available in Sui Northern Gas Pipeline Limited (SNGPL) system, where as 1,200 million cubic feet of imported liquefied natural gas from Qatar will also strengthen the local supply to fulfill the domestic energy demands. He informed that the government had taken appropriate measures to bridge the demand-supply gap of energy, including the import of LNG from Qatar to produce electricity at a low cost, compared to production by furnace oil.
He said that the initiative would also help the government to overcome the electricity crisis and produce cheap energy for domestic and industrial consumption.
He further informed that imported LNG would help to produce 30 per cent cheaper and 50 per cent extra electricity as compared to the production of the furnace oil. He informed that the LNG deal with Qatar was completely transparent, which was negotiated by a high powered committee comprising senior officials of different ministries including ministries of petroleum, water, power and finance. He said the deal was completely transparent, swift and cheap, adding that after the negotiation, the price was fixed at 13.7 cents of the brent, adding that countries including Japan and India were purchasing costlier LNG.
Miftah Ismail said that government was ready to share the details of LNG import deal with Qatar at any forum and anyone. He said that the first LNG terminal was installed by Engro Company at Port Qasim, which had a capacity to supply about 960 million cubic feet, adding that the government will install another LNG terminal which would be operational by November this year. He said that two private sector companies have also shown their interest to install LNG terminals, besides construction of pipelines. Besides, he said that under the government initiative to bridge the energy demand-supply gap, a pipeline form Karachi to Lahore was completed with a total cost of US$ one billion to improve the gas supply and rationalise cost of electricity generation. Work on Turkmenistan -Afghanistan-Pakistan-India Pipeline (TAPI) was also in progress, which would enter in Pakistan from Balochistan and put a positive impact on the national economy, he added.
Highlighting the performance of the government during the last four years, he said that the highest GDP growth rate was achieved for the first time, besides revenue collection recorded at about 50 per cent increase on year-on-year basis.
During the last fiscal year, revenue collection was recorded at Rs 3,200 billion, where s government has set a revenue collection targets at Rs 4,100 billion for the current fiscal year which will help the government to increase its spending on social sector uplift.
