January 05, 2008	Saturday	Zilhaj 25, 1428

LAHORE, Jan 4: The Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) has partially restored gas supply to some 350 textile units in the Punjab and the NWFP.

Gas supplies to over 1,100 industrial units still remains switched off because of weather conditions which had earlier forced the company to suspend supplies to various units. However, in case of any drop in mercury, as forecast by the meteorological department, the company may again snap supplies to the restored units in the next 36 hours.

According to company officials, processing plants of the restored textile units have been allowed to start work, consuming 20 per cent of their full load which may help the industry for the next 40 hours.

The company further stated that it had started receiving 70 million cubic feet of additional supplies from Zamzama Gas Field in Sindh as train service had started taking condensate oil from the field to the refinery.

For the last few days, the company was getting only 130mmcf from the field, which increased to 200mmcf on Friday.

It got a further relief of 30mmcf, and with a slight improvement in weather on Friday when the overall deficit came down to 500mmcf against 600mmcf till Thursday. Of the 100mmcf supplies, the company diverted 40mmcf to the power sector and 60mmcf to the textile units.

“If weather takes a dip again, the textile units would be put off first as power crunch in the country will make it hard for the company to stop supplies to it,” says an official of the company.