Senate Body For Timely Completion Of LPG Air Mix Plants

The Senate Functional Committee on Problems of Less Developed Areas in its meeting here Tuesday, has directed Sui Southern Gas Limited (SSGC) to ensure timely completion of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) Air Mix plants to be established in Balochistan province.

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 11th Sep, 2018 ) :The Senate Functional Committee on Problems of Less Developed Areas in its meeting here Tuesday, has directed Sui Southern Gas Limited (SSGC) to ensure timely completion of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) Air Mix plants to be established in Balochistan province.

Chairman of the Committee Senator Muhammad Usman Khan Kakar while presiding over the meeting, said the population of the country has increased by 120 per cent according to latest Census 2017. Therefore, provision of gas should be made feasible in line with the increase in population, he added.

"Balochistan province faces extreme cold weather in winter season that sometimes drop below -18�C where people do not use gas to cook rather survive in that severe atmosphere", he said. The SSGC officials while briefing the Committee, informed that 30 Air Mix Plants would be installed in three phases with 10 plants each. They informed that the provincial government has started providing land for the project where construction would be started and completed soon.

To a question, the Managing Director SSGC said the tariffs for the Air Mix LPG would be the same as for natural gas.

"SSGC has installed new gas pipelines in Shikarpur-Jacobabad and Balochistan to mitigate the issue of reduced gas pressure during cold season", he informed adding that Mastung-Kalat gas shortage issue would also be resolved during this season.

The representative of Sui Northern Gas Limited Corporation (SNGC) briefed the Committee that land acquisition was under way for setting up of Air Mix LNG plants in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Azad Jammu and Kashmir and Gilgit Baltistan where SNGC special teams are taking action against consumers illegally using gas suction pumps.

An official of Oil and Gas Development Company Limited (OGDCL) informed that there are 12,900 employees where it has one year paid internship program. All recruitment were made through National Testing Service (NTS) exams where the top scorers got recruited and there was no quota system rather equal representation of all the provinces ensured, he said.

The OGDCL official said 300 internees are hired with 75 from each province.

The Committee recommended OGDCL officials to give 10-15 percent gross marks to the aspirants from less developed areas particularly Balochistan.