PESHAWAR: The Peshawar High Court on Tuesday issued a notice to the Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority seeking its explanation on the frequent outages and low pressure of the natural gas supplied to domestic consumers in the province.

A bench consisting of Chief Justice Qaiser Rashid Khan and Justice Ijaz Anwar directed the Ogra chairman to respond to the points raised by a petition on the matter on Jan 24 and adjourned the hearing until then.

Lawyer has challenged poor gas supply to domestic consumers in province

The petition is filed by advocate Abbas Khan Sangeen, who requested the court to declare gas loadshedding and low pressure unconstitutional and illegal.

The petitioner contended that the Sui Northern Gas Pipelines Limited (SNGPL) violated Article 158 of the Constitution and a high court judgement by resorting to outages and low pressure of the natural gas.

He said that Article 158 of the Constitution declared that the province with a wellhead of natural gas should have precedence over other parts of the country for meeting its needs from that facility.

Mr Abbas said that in 2011, a high court bench had ordered the uninterrupted supply of natural gas to the areas producing it.

The respondents in the petition are the federal government through the energy secretary, the provincial government through the chief secretary, Ogra chairman, secretaries of the inter-provincial coordination and natural resources ministries, and the SNGPL general manager in Peshawar.

SNGPL general manager Taj Ali Khan also turned up in the court and said that the supply of natural gas to the province was far better compared with rest of the country.

He rejected the petitioner’s claim about the massive loadshedding and low pressure of the natural gas in the province and insisted that domestic gas consumers were their priority regarding gas supply.

Mr Khan said that there was a wide gas supply-demand gap across the country, but the SNGPL was still trying its level best to provide the gas to domestic consumers.

The chief justice observed that the court had reports suggesting that in certain areas, children went to school without eating breakfast due to the suspension of gas supply.

The petitioner said KP had been producing natural gas more than the need of its domestic and commercial consumers, but that aspect wasn’t considered by the respondents, including the SNGPL and Ogra, so the residents suffered from the continuous gas outages and low pressure.

He pointed out that the respondents, including the petroleum secretary and SNGPL general manager, had admitted in their respective comments that the overall consumption of natural gas by the people in KP in the winter season was around 350MMCFD, whereas the production in the province was 400-405 MMCFD showing that the production was in excess of its consumption.

The petitioner also said that gas supply to CNG stations had been drastically reduced troubling the people, while it was suspended on different days of the week.

He said that when there was a shortage of natural gas, then why authorities had allowing the establishment of CNG stations in the close vicinity to the existing ones.

The petroleum secretary and SNGPL general manager insisted in their respective response to the petition contended that the petition was not maintainable, so it should be dismissed.

The secretary said that the demand for gas in the country was in excess of the local supply and the federal government was making all-out efforts to meet the nationwide demand.

He added that the federal government, to manage gas allocation and load management, had approved the Natural Gas Allocation and Management Policy, 2005, which declared gas supply to domestic consumers a top priority.

Published in Dawn, December 21st, 2022