Anisul Islam Noor :
The government has initiated to build an intra-country pipeline to carry petroleum products from Chittagong to Dhaka at low cost and less time, sources said.
The pipeline would be around 250-270 kilometres (km) in length and carry mostly diesel amounting to around 3.0 million tonnes annually from Chittagong oil tank terminal to Dhaka depots, said Mosleh Uddin, Director (operation and Planning) of Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC).
He said Padma Oil Company Ltd (POCL), a wholly-owned subsidiary of BPC, has been inviting bids from interested parties to construct the pipeline.
The POCL would be the implementing authority of the ‘white’ pipeline.
White pipeline means the pipeline that carries refined petroleum products.
Although the government has planned to import mainly diesel through the pipeline, it could, if necessary, be able to import other refined petroleum products too, said a senior official of energy and mineral resources division under the Ministry of Power, Energy and Mineral Resources.
State-owned POCL in its tender sought to construct the pipeline by a selected contractor on build, own and operate and transfer (BOOT) basis.
The interested parties have been asked to submit expression of interests to the POCL within the bid submission deadline on August 24, 2016.
EOI documents could be purchased by any interested party or consortium by July 25.
The POCL will appoint an international consultant to get suggestions in building the pipeline, said a senior BPC official. The POCL would offer concession to the contractor, which would include the right to collect tolls, fees, or charges to generate income from the completed project facilities.
The POCL sought a minimum of 20 per cent share annually from revenue to be earned from the pipeline project during the concession term.
Officials said a Chinese firm, China Petroleum Pipeline Bureau (CPPB) had submitted an ‘unsolicited’ proposal to build the pipeline in August, 2015.
A subsidiary of China’s state-owned China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC), the CPPB had submitted the proposal to BPC and requested it to take the proposal into consideration.
The Chinese proposal, however, is still pending with the government.
BPC currently imports 0.20 per cent sulphur gasoil (diesel) from Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC) and 0.05 per cent sulphur gasoil from Emirates National Oil Company (ENOC), and Unipec Singapore Pte Ltd.
The BPC official said the proposed pipeline is set to carry diesel from BPC’s Chittagong tank terminal to Godnail tank terminal in Narayanganj.
The final location would, however, would be selected on consultant’s recommendations, he said.
Bangladesh never thought of building the pipeline to carry petroleum products inside the country earlier.
Tank-lorries owned by private sector and state-run Bangladesh Railway (BR) carry petroleum products from oil depots to different user-ends.
Small cargoes mostly owned by private sector have also been carrying petroleum on various river routes.
BPC has to count around Tk 1.40 billion annually to transport fuel from Chittagong to Dhaka, said the BPC official. Sometimes it takes several days to transport required quantity of fuel to desired destinations. Government’s huge costs could be cut once the pipeline is built, he said.
BPC currently imports around 3.0-3.5 million tonnes of diesel from international suppliers to meet domestic demand. BPC’s wholly-owned subsidiary Eastern Refinery Ltd (ERL) produces around 380,000 tonnes of diesel per year despite having the capacity of producing 1.5 million tonnes annually.
