Gas losing fast its promise of bounty
Friday, 13 March 2009
THE country is now face to face with one of its worst predicaments on the energy front in history. In fact, an ambience of complacency was created earlier by some quarters who were advocating export of gas based on the argument that the country was virtually floating on gas. That is now growingly turning into a daydream. Very recently, it was widely circulated in the media that the French oil and gas exploration company, Total, that holds the right to carry out exploration activities in the Blocks 17 and 18 situated in the Cox's Bazar district and in the Bay of Bengal had stumbled upon the possibility of huge deposits of gas in those blocks through their initial survey. Unfortunately, the company has now come to the conclusion that their initial idea was wrong. The company in question, along with its partners, shares the stakes in those gas blocks including their operational rights. The gas blocks stretch over a vast swathe of land and sea equivalent to 18, 367 square kilometres up to the Saint Martins' Island bordering on Myanmar.
Now that Total has given up its exploratory rights on those blocks, the options will be open for the state-owned gas and oil corporation Petrobangla to go for re-bidding, if feasible, of the blocks once termed promising but now declared empty by the French energy company of global repute. The result of the three-dimensional as well as seismic surveys conducted by Total is really shocking for Bangladesh. For at the moment the country is facing its worst crisis so far as the availability of its main energy-base, gas, is concerned. The reserve of gas in the fields already in use is fast depleting. The fields will be exhausted by 2011, a deadline that is just round the corner. Based on earlier prognostications, the country was pinning much hope on the gas blocks that were still remaining unexplored. The gas blocks now abandoned by the French energy company were once a great source of hope. As if piling on our woes, last month the other onshore gas block (Block 5) in the south-eastern part of the country was declared barren in a similar fashion by the British energy company, Cairns.
The latest reports on the situation of the country's oil and natural gas deposits are like strong gusts of evil wind that is about to extinguish its flickering hope that the good old days of self-assuredness over gas will again return. But through the process of elimination of one unexplored gas block after another, the possibilities of any fresh source of hydrocarbon deposit are gradually narrowing down. The gas-starved Chittagong region pinned much hope on the gas blocks 17 and 18. But the withdrawal of Total has dashed its hope. Similarly, the gas-fired power stations of the country are facing a serious gas shortage. If gas was available, the old power generation units could be rejuvenated, while fresh gas-operated power plants might be established.
The country is at the moment going through a severe power shortage, adversely affecting public life, work in offices, production in the manufacturing sector as well as irrigated agriculture. Needless to mention, the majority of its power plants are operated by gas. The moment of truth has arrived for the nation. It has to decide here and now what course of action it will take so that its march forward in attaining economic self-sufficiency with business, industries and agriculture going in full swing may not stop in the middle of nowhere.
Now that Total has given up its exploratory rights on those blocks, the options will be open for the state-owned gas and oil corporation Petrobangla to go for re-bidding, if feasible, of the blocks once termed promising but now declared empty by the French energy company of global repute. The result of the three-dimensional as well as seismic surveys conducted by Total is really shocking for Bangladesh. For at the moment the country is facing its worst crisis so far as the availability of its main energy-base, gas, is concerned. The reserve of gas in the fields already in use is fast depleting. The fields will be exhausted by 2011, a deadline that is just round the corner. Based on earlier prognostications, the country was pinning much hope on the gas blocks that were still remaining unexplored. The gas blocks now abandoned by the French energy company were once a great source of hope. As if piling on our woes, last month the other onshore gas block (Block 5) in the south-eastern part of the country was declared barren in a similar fashion by the British energy company, Cairns.
The latest reports on the situation of the country's oil and natural gas deposits are like strong gusts of evil wind that is about to extinguish its flickering hope that the good old days of self-assuredness over gas will again return. But through the process of elimination of one unexplored gas block after another, the possibilities of any fresh source of hydrocarbon deposit are gradually narrowing down. The gas-starved Chittagong region pinned much hope on the gas blocks 17 and 18. But the withdrawal of Total has dashed its hope. Similarly, the gas-fired power stations of the country are facing a serious gas shortage. If gas was available, the old power generation units could be rejuvenated, while fresh gas-operated power plants might be established.
The country is at the moment going through a severe power shortage, adversely affecting public life, work in offices, production in the manufacturing sector as well as irrigated agriculture. Needless to mention, the majority of its power plants are operated by gas. The moment of truth has arrived for the nation. It has to decide here and now what course of action it will take so that its march forward in attaining economic self-sufficiency with business, industries and agriculture going in full swing may not stop in the middle of nowhere.