ISLAMABAD – Federal Minister for Petroleum, Ghulam Sarwar Khan has hintedto establish a Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) storage facility for maintainingstrategic stock of the commodity to meet energy needs of the country.
In a recent interview with PTV, he said there were reservoirs of petroleumproducts, but the country hadno LNG storage facility, which was beyond comprehension as why the previousgovernment did not payany attention towards it.“It (LNG) comes straightway from vessel, shifted to terminal and injectedto transmission lines directlyfor onward supply to consumers. Sometimes it (LNG) can be in surplus orotherwise. There must be itsstocks,” he said.
Ghulam Sarwar said Saudi Arabia, which was expected to sign a Memorandum ofUnderstanding withPakistan next month for establishment of a mega oil city at Gwadar, hadalso offered assistance toestablish LNG reservoirs.
Besides, Saudi Arabia is showing keen interest to work in diverse fieldsincluding mineral,fertilizer, wind and solar energy.
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Answering a question, the minister said it was the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf(PTI) government that madethe petroleum sector part of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC)project, following which a megaoil city, consisting of oil refineries and petrochemical complex, was beingset up at the Gwadar deepseaport city – an ultimate destination of the CPEC.“Earlier, there was no mention of petroleum sector in the CPEC project,” hesaid adding, there was onrecord that the PTI government took the initiative and made it (petroleumsector) the part of CPEC.
After establishment of the oil city, he said, Pakistan would be able torefine and store imported oil foronward transportation to China using the CPEC route, besides developingfuel supply chain for thelandlocked Central Asian states.The fuel transportation to China via Pakistan would take just seven days asimport through westernChina takes almost 40 days. Currently, oil vessels take 40 days to reachChina, while throughPakistan the oil supply will reach China within seven days.The minister said the government was taking practical measures to improveoil and gas transmissionnetwork across the country, besides achieving self-sufficiency in theenergy sector.
