Govt to engage pvt sector to build oil depots
Wednesday, 9 June 2010
M Azizur Rahman
The government has decided to engage the private sector for the first time to build oil depots for ramping up the country's overall petroleum storage capacity to ensure uninterrupted fuel supply to the new fuel-run power plants, officials said Sunday.
State-owned Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) would soon seek expression of interests (EoI) from the interested private parties to construct several depots, and thus ensure timely supply of petroleum across the country, a senior energy ministry official told the FE Sunday.
"We are interested to build oil storage facilities by the private sector, as the government is now in dearth of adequate funding," said the energy ministry official.
He said the government would provide rent and other relevant charges to the private depot-owners against their service of providing oil storage facilities to the government.
At present, BPC has around 1.0 million tonnes of fuel storage capacity in all of its depots to meet the annual fuel requirement of around 3.65 million tonnes.
The corporation primarily estimated that it would require ramping up annual fuel import by at least 33 per cent to 4.85 million tonnes from the current 3.65 million tonnes within next two years to operate the planned diesel and furnace oil-based power plants. An additional import of 1.2 million tonnes of fuel would be required every year to ensure that the oil-run power plants run smoothly, the BPC officials said.
The government has recently approved a dozen of oil-based rental power plants to generate around 1,200 megawatts (mw) of electricity to ease the country's mounting power crisis. The power ministry has planned to generate around 4,270 mw of electricity by diesel and furnace oil-run power plants.
Of the total plants, 1,450 mw capacity diesel and furnace oil-run power plants will be commissioned in 2010, 620 mw oil-fired plants in 2011, 1,800 mw capacity in 2012, and 400 mw oil-fired capacity plants in 2013.
BPC has been discharged with the responsibility to ensure fuel supply to all these fuel-run power plants. Besides, sponsors of the power plants would also be asked to construct tankers at the plant sites to ensure smooth functioning of the plants.
"It would be impossible to meet the mounting oil demand with the state-owned depots alone," BPC Chairman Anwarul Karim told the FE. He hoped that private oil storage facilities would be built within the shortest possible time to cope with the demand.
Officials said oil storage capacity of BPC's subsidiary Eastern Refinery Ltd (ERL) would be ramped up to 70,000 tonnes from the current capacity of 55,000 tonnes to make room for additional oil import.
Besides, storage capacity of several state-owned depots would also be raised by around 10,000 tonnes each to facilitate additional fuel consumption.
The government has decided to engage the private sector for the first time to build oil depots for ramping up the country's overall petroleum storage capacity to ensure uninterrupted fuel supply to the new fuel-run power plants, officials said Sunday.
State-owned Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) would soon seek expression of interests (EoI) from the interested private parties to construct several depots, and thus ensure timely supply of petroleum across the country, a senior energy ministry official told the FE Sunday.
"We are interested to build oil storage facilities by the private sector, as the government is now in dearth of adequate funding," said the energy ministry official.
He said the government would provide rent and other relevant charges to the private depot-owners against their service of providing oil storage facilities to the government.
At present, BPC has around 1.0 million tonnes of fuel storage capacity in all of its depots to meet the annual fuel requirement of around 3.65 million tonnes.
The corporation primarily estimated that it would require ramping up annual fuel import by at least 33 per cent to 4.85 million tonnes from the current 3.65 million tonnes within next two years to operate the planned diesel and furnace oil-based power plants. An additional import of 1.2 million tonnes of fuel would be required every year to ensure that the oil-run power plants run smoothly, the BPC officials said.
The government has recently approved a dozen of oil-based rental power plants to generate around 1,200 megawatts (mw) of electricity to ease the country's mounting power crisis. The power ministry has planned to generate around 4,270 mw of electricity by diesel and furnace oil-run power plants.
Of the total plants, 1,450 mw capacity diesel and furnace oil-run power plants will be commissioned in 2010, 620 mw oil-fired plants in 2011, 1,800 mw capacity in 2012, and 400 mw oil-fired capacity plants in 2013.
BPC has been discharged with the responsibility to ensure fuel supply to all these fuel-run power plants. Besides, sponsors of the power plants would also be asked to construct tankers at the plant sites to ensure smooth functioning of the plants.
"It would be impossible to meet the mounting oil demand with the state-owned depots alone," BPC Chairman Anwarul Karim told the FE. He hoped that private oil storage facilities would be built within the shortest possible time to cope with the demand.
Officials said oil storage capacity of BPC's subsidiary Eastern Refinery Ltd (ERL) would be ramped up to 70,000 tonnes from the current capacity of 55,000 tonnes to make room for additional oil import.
Besides, storage capacity of several state-owned depots would also be raised by around 10,000 tonnes each to facilitate additional fuel consumption.