ISLAMABAD: The Sui Northern Gas Pipeline Limited (SNGPL) announced to have unaccounted for gas (UFG) reduced by 128 percent which translates into 23,348 MMCF saving-a part of three-year UFG Reduction Plan approved by the federal government.
According to the SNGPL, there may be other contributing factors which led to this achievement; the corporate coherence between the recently-appointed acting Managing Director Amer Tufail and the Company’s Board of Directors (BoD) is also being credited much for the said development.
According to the details, the SNGPL has been undertaking a three-year UFG Reduction Plan, from the fiscal year 2018-19 to the fiscal year 2021-22, approved by the federal government.
Under the said programme, the company was assigned a target of reducing UFG by 18,240 MMCF. The company has so far exceeded the target by reducing UFG by 23,348 MMCF, hence, bringing it down to 29,228 MMCF in the fiscal year 2021-22 from 52,576 MMCF in the fiscal year 2018-19.
The reduction in gas losses is in no way an ordinary achievement since it also involves similar targets for the oil and gas producing areas of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa. These areas were contributing around 34 percent of the total volumetric losses in the fiscal year 2018-19.
Due to the various sensitivities involved, the company devised a detailed two-pronged strategy to execute the UFG reduction plan in the area. The strategy, approved by the federal cabinet, comprised of extension and rehabilitation of legal gas network and provision of gas connection on fast track basis at one level.
On the other level, the strategy focused on apprehending gas pilferers through the administrative support of law enforcement agencies. As part of the first phase, the company laid 462-kilometer-long network while installing more than 13,000 new connections. In the next phase, the company has so far completed laying of 711 kilometre network and rehabilitation of 220 kilometres network.
Further, the company removed more than 18,000 illegal taps while lodging 366 FIRs against the culprits. In order to provide sustainable foundation to these tasks, the company office in Karak was upgraded and dedicated human resource was stationed at the office to look after the developmental and UFG control activities. As a result of tireless efforts, the company was finally able to reduce UFG in the region by 53 percent, from 15,391 MMCF in FY 2018-19 to 7,238 MMCF in FY 2021-22.
Sui Northern has 16 distribution regions and as such region-specific strategies were tailored to reduce gas losses through different UFG control measures including gas theft control, rectification of gas leakages and resolution of measurement errors. Additionally, monitoring of all Industrial and commercial consumers on a monthly and quarterly basis was ensured.
The company utilised SCADA system for monitoring of industrial connections. Leakage control measures were initiated including overhead and underground leakage rectification and replacement of deteriorated gas network. Timely replacement of meters was also ensured. As a result, UFG losses of eight regions were reduced to below OGRA’s UFG Benchmark of 6.98 percent in the fiscal year 2021-22.
The incoming results under the same UFG reduction programme for the fiscal year 2022-23 are also equally encouraging.
The SNGPL is now implementing a three-year sustainability and UFG Reduction Plan starting from the fiscal year 2022-23 and ending in the fiscal year 2024-25.
The programme already approved by the Board of Directors will focus on continuing the two-pronged strategy in oil-producing areas of Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa; micro monitoring of losses at TBS level; infrastructure improvement in the gas network of major cities like Lahore, Islamabad/Rawalpindi and Gujranwala; isolation of SMS and industrial clusters; and use of technology to curb gas theft and leakage control.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2023
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