ISLAMABAD: Minister of State for Petroleum Jam Kamal Khan Wednesday informed the Senate’s Standing Committee on Energy that Sui Southern Gas Company Limited (SSGCL) would set up 10 LPG-air mix plants in its operation area during the current fiscal year.
The minister apprised the committee, which met with Mir Israrullah Khan Zehri in the chair, that the government was encouraging setting up of more Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG)-air mix plants in selected areas where natural gas supply did not exist.
He sought suggestions and site identification from parliamentarians, who desired gasification of the towns in far-flung and hilly areas.
The SSGCL managing director briefed the body that currently the company had managed finances for 10 LPG units and it was in the process of floating a tender for them.
Jam Kamal said the company was facing problems in acquiring land, due to high prices, in Balochistan for the LPG plants as four to five-acre land was required for a single plant in the closest vicinity of the town where the commodity would be supplied.
The body was also apprised that two state companies, Sui Northern Gas Pipeline Limited (SNGPL) and Sui Southern Gas Company Limited (SSGCL), would establish around 65 LPG-air mix plants, out of which 30 would be in Balochistan, 2 each in Sindh and Gilgit-Baltistan, 10 in Azad Jammu and Kashmir, 3 in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and 18 in Punjab.
Earlier, officials from the Petroleum Division briefed the committee on budgetary allocation and its bi-annual utilisation for the period January-June 2017, by the then Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources.
The body also took up a petition of four SSGCL’s contractual employees, whose services were terminated after they could not pass the NTS (National Testing Service) test.
The committee members observed that the SSGCL administration should look into ways and means for the amicable and legal solution of the issue.
Among others, the meeting was attended by Senators Baz Muhammad Khan, Mir Muhammad Yousaf Badini, Taj Muhammad Afridi, Hamza, Nisar Muhammad and Muhammad Yousaf, besides Minister of State for power division Abid Sher Ali, secretaries, director general geological survey of Pakistan and officials of oil and gas regulatory authority.
