ISLAMABAD: The private companies that have imported the Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) have so far not been able to start consuming the commodity because of red-tapism that has inflicted a colossal loss to Pakistan. The top bureaucracy of gas utilities — Sui Southern (SS) and Sui Northern (SN) — want to pass on the 10 percent unaccounted for gas (UFG) to importers.
Both, the Pak-Arab Fertiliser Limited Company and Universal Gas Distribution Company Private Limited, have failed to use their commodities mainly because of the UFG issue and non-availability of notified tariffs by Ogra, a senior official told The News on condition of anonymity.
Hopefully, the thorny issues of UFG and tariff notification by the regulator will be decided during the next two working days, a top official of Sui Northern said.
Both, the Sui Southern and Sui Northern, which are on the verge of bankruptcy because of the current UFG that has been reduced to 4.5 percent and no raise in gas tariff since July 2014, want to charge the maximum UFG of 10 percent from the CNG sector.
Though determination of the UFG is the domain of Ogra, the gas utilities want to charge the maximum UFG from the LNG consumers arguing Ogra has nothing to do with the UFG issue when it comes to the private consumers of LNG.
The UFG is the highest in the domestic sector but the gas utilities weren’t to pass on their losses to the importers.
The Sui Northern says that the average price of gas across the country stands at Rs380 per MMBTU and 10 percent of the said price is the UFG. The officials said that Sui Northern wanted to charge the losses of other consumers from the CNG sector which is sheer injustice to it. The official also said that private sector had agreed to pay the price of UFG but for the loss that was registered only in the CNG sector not in other sectors.
The official also stated that private sector wanted to get the UFG in the CNG sector verified in audit accounts of
the companies and then ready to pay the price of the verified UFG. However, the CNG sector is not ready to allow the Sui Northern and Sui Southern to cut the volume of gas in the head of UFG.
The official said that the CNG sector stated it had imported 100 MMCFD gas and wanted to consume the whole volume of gas and did not want to allow the gas utilities slash the gas under the head of UFG. The current CNG gas tariff is Rs656 per MMBTU and if the UFG of the CNG sector is deemed, the sector is to pay against the UFG.
Federal Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, a day before, while talking to The News, had said that Sui Northern would 100 MMCFD gas and wanted to consume the whole volume of gas and did not want to allow the gas utilities cut the gas in the head of UFG. The current CNG gas tariff is Rs656 per MMBTU and if the UFG of the CNG sector is deemed, the sector is to pay against the UFG.
Federal Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, a day before, while talking to The News had said that Sui Northern would charge 11.5 percent UFG (unaccounted for gas) from the CNG sector. The minister said that the study showed that in the last three and a half years, over 11 percent UFG volume at CNG stations in Punjab had been identified as most of the CNG stations were installed at gas distribution system. However, the UFG stands at 0.5 percent at all business houses, which are installed at transmission lines. So, they will have to pay against the said volume of UFG to Sui Northern in the case of using the LNG. The minister said that RLNG that would be used by CNG would be competitive as there would be no GIDC (Gas Infrastructure Development Cess) on LNG to be used by CNG and on top of that general sales tax had been reduced to 5 percent from 17 percent on import of the commodity to be used by the CNG sector. This will help the availability of CNG in Pakistan at 30 percent parity with petrol.