Gas shortfall expected to reach 4.2bcfd in 10 years

ISLAMABAD: Gap in demand and supply of gas is expected to reach 4.2 billion cubic feet per day (bcfd) by FY2030-31 from 1.3 bcfd, in the fiscal year of 2019/20, Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (Ogra) said.

The indigenous gas production fell 10 percent to 2,138 million cubic feet per day (mmcfd)) in last fiscal year from 2,379 mmcfd a year earlier and gas consumption declined 6 percent to 3,714 mmcfd from 3,969 mmcfd during the corresponding period.

In a report on ‘state of the regulated petroleum industry 2019-20’ on Wednesday, Ogra said the deficit between production and consumption was partially met through import of liquefied natural gas whose share in natural gas supplies increased from 27 percent to 29 percent during the year.

As per the report, the country transmission network is spread over 13,452 kilometers and distribution network on 177,029 kms gas pipelines, providing natural gas to domestic, industrial, commercial and transport sectors.

During the period under review, the SNGPL and SSGC had collectively extended their transmission network by 190km and 72km, respectively. The Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) extended its distribution network by 5,731km and Sui Southern Gas Company (SSGC) by 527km. The SNGPL provided 271,228 new connections, which took the number of total consumers on its network to 7 million.

The SSGC added 95,011 new connections making a total of 3.1 million consumers on its network.

Overall, there were 10.12 million natural gas consumers in the country by the end of financial year 2019-20. The main consumer of natural gas was power sector that utilised 33 percent (1,198 mmcfd), followed by domestic sector with 24 percent (888 mmcfd), fertiliser 21 percent (779 mmcfd), general industry 9 percent (327 mmcfd) and captive power 8 percent (290 mmcfd) of the total gas consumed during the period under review.

The province-wise gas consumption showed that Punjab’s share was 56 percent (1,471 mmcfd), Sindh 33 percent (874 mmcfd), Khyber Pakhtunkhwa 9 percent (249 mmcfd) and Balochistan 2 percent (48 mmcfd) of total gas consumption.

Natural gas supply during the year was 4,052 mmcfd mainly contributed by the major gas fields including Mari, Sui, Uch, Qadirpur, Kandhkot and Maramzai.

Out of the total supplies, 1,057 mmcfd of gas was supplied by the gas fields/producers directly to their consumers and the remaining through gas utility companies.

Sindh’s share in gas supply was 45 percent (1,344 mmcfd), whereas Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Balochistan and Punjab supplied 12 percent (368 mmcfd), 11 percent (335 percent) and 3 percent (91 mmcfd) respectively. The remaining 29 percent (857 mmcfd) of gas supplied was the imported LNG.