ISLAMABAD, Aug 4: Four out of five major projects including gas import pipelines planned by the government to meet energy shortage are unlikely to be materialised, creating fears of severe energy crisis after three years.Informed sources told Dawn that Gwadar port, three gas import pipeline project - Qatar, Turkmenistan and Iran - and import of liquefied natural gas projects were planed for implementation by the ministry of petroleum and natural resources and Planning Commission between the period of 2006 to 2011.

According to a latest status report of the petroleum ministry, the import of gas from Qatar was no more a feasible option because of shortage of surplus gas in Qatar and hence out of discussions. Mr Ehsanullah Khan, the pointman who used to interact with Pakistan government on behalf of Crescent Petroleum of Sharjah for more than 15 years is currently working as Pakistan’s ambassador in one of the countries in the Middle East. The multi-billion dollar Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan (TAP) pipeline project is currently faced with seven major bottlenecks, says the petroleum ministry. These include non-confirmation of uncommitted gas volume by Turkmenistan regarding Daulatabad gas field, uncertainties or lack of clarity with regard to price of the gas to be demanded by Turkmenistan and security situation in Afghanistan.

Also there are significant difficulties in the expected implementation of security and risk mitigation measures proposed by the Asian Development Bank’s consultant and usual delays of the Turkmen government in complying with the decisions taken by the tripartite steering committee.

The ministry has also identified as bottlenecks the third party guarantees for the required gas allocation by Turkmenistan government and internal political situation in Turkmenistan. Pakistan had planned under its 30-year Energy Security Plan to commence the project in 2007 and complete it in 2011 - both targets seem unachievable in the given conditions.

The Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline also is moving very slowly due to stalemate over the finalisation of gas pricing mechanism. The rituals like exchange of delegations among the three countries have been very frequent but there has been no progress on at least four issues - gas pricing, project structure, project framework agreement and joint declaration.

The three countries have now agreed to appoint a consultant to suggest a price for Iranian gas to be delivered to the two energy-deficient South Asian countries after their officials failed in New Delhi to agree on a gas tariff. Pakistan and India have proposed two consultants — Poten and Partners and Vicce — and have asked Iran to select between the two so that a report could be finalised within a month or so.

In this project, political interests of the three nations are at odds. One of the obstacles in this project is that Pakistan prefers to have this pipeline as a bilateral project with Iran to ensure maximum gas quantities but both India and Iran want its extension to India.

Similarly, India and Pakistan have a common interest in low gas prices of not more than $4.5 per Million British Thermal Units (MMBTU) but Iran wants a higher price of $7-8 per MMBTU. Both India and Pakistan are also concerned about Iran’s complicated international decision making process and Iran’s slow reaction and response to various issues and think that Iran’s price tag was "unreasonable".

The three countries have also been failed to appoint a lead sponsor to conduct a feasibility study of the project despite discussing this issue for many months. The government of Pakistan had envisaged this project to start in 2007 and complete in 2011 but appeared far from becoming reality as scheduled.

The ambitious Gwadar port was another major initiative towards meeting energy requirements in addition to other transit trade activities but would largely depend on security situation in Balochistan where a full fledged operation was still in progress.The fifth and the only project that did not face any bottleneck at present is import of Liquefied Natural Gas Project but its in-built difficulties of high spot market rates would haunt the nation for long. This project envisaged import of 500 million cubic feet of gas per day (MMCFD) by 2010. The detailed feasibility study of the project would be undertaken by a private sector joint venture to be appointed by December 2006.