BPC starts unloading diesel using undersea pipeline

The State-run Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) started unloading diesel for the first time through the newly built single-point mooring (SPM) in deep sea on Tuesday following successful unloading of crude oil.
Unloading of around 600,000 tonnes of diesel from offshore mother vessels to onshore storage facilities at Moheshkhali island would be completed today (Wednesday) using the SPM, a senior BPC official told the FE on Tuesday.
Under the Single Point Mooring (SPM) project, two parallel 110-km pipelines have been installed-- one for crude oil and the other for diesel. There is a floating mooring point in the deep of the Bay of Bengal and a storage tank terminal in Maheshkhali.
China Petroleum Pipeline Engineering Co Ltd (CPPEC) is supervising unloading of oil as part of its job to ensure commissioning of the SPM project.
Like crude oil, diesel will be stored in oil storage tanks at Moheshkhali, some 16 kilometers (km) away from the SPM, said the official.
Petroleum Transmission Company Ltd, a newly incorporated subsidiary company of state-owned BPC will supervise operations of the SPM after commissioning.
Before, lighter vessels were used loading petroleum products from large tankers and carrying those to the refinery which normally took 10-11 days.
Once the SPM becomes fully operational, Bangladesh would annually save around Tk 8.0 billion (US$75.50 million) solely by reducing transportation costs of petroleum products from outer anchorage to onshore fuel tankers taking time only two to three days, official said.
The BPC has been implementing the key project at a cost of around Tk 65.68 billion, with China's assistance.
Out of the total project cost, the government contributed around Tk 12.19 billion, BPC around Tk 6.85 billion, and the remaining Tk 46.63 billion came as project aid.
Construction for the fuel-pumping stations and six fuel-storage tanks have been completed.

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