Daily Times

KARACHI: Hascol Petroleum on Thursday announced that the company has planned to develop a Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) terminal at Port Qasim, Karachi

In this regard, the company has applied for a marketing and distribution license of LPG with the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority (OGRA) and the matter regarding the license is under active consideration for approval of the authority, according to Company Secretary, Zeeshan ul Haq, in the stock filing.

For the plan, the company has acquired five acres of land at Port Qasim and has also filed an application to acquire an additional ten acres of land for developing the LPG terminal.

Recently, Hascol Petroleum announced that the company, in partnership with Dubai-based Vitol, will widen the scope of its operations with the addition of a 200,000-ton oil storage facility at Port Qasim and equity injection of Rs 375 million.

In this regard, the company will establish a separate firm as a joint venture with Vitol, a global energy and commodity trading concern, which has recently bought a 15 percent stake in Hascol for $28.1 million. The new oil tank will increase the storage capacity for white and black oil and help the fast-growing oil marketing company to broaden its network of retail outlets in the country. Land has already been acquired and formal approval is required from OGRA in order to begin construction. It may then be commissioned by the end of 2017.

New storage facilities are also in the construction phase in Sahiwal and the company has laid the foundation stone of storage facilities near Islamabad where Frontier Works Organization (FWO) has given appropriate land to Hascol.

Earlier in 2016, Pakistan and Iran signed a deal under which the former will import 75,000 tons of LPG within a year and at least 6,000 tones of LPG will be imported from Iran every month over the course of a year.

Engro Vopak Terminal Limited operates the terminal and storage facility for bulk liquid chemicals and LPG in Pakistan, which is just one of the 67 terminals of Vopak in 25 countries with a total capacity of around 34.7 million CBM around the world. The total storage capacity for LPG now stands at 7000 MT. SSGC LPG (Pvt.) Limited (SLL) is a subsidiary of Sui Southern Gas Company Limited engaged in LPG marketing and distribution across the country.