While there are various discussions about the instability in the oil market and the storage capacity in Bangladesh, the huge infrastructure built at a cost of 8,300 crore taka in Maheshkhali of Cox's Bazar to unload and transport oil directly from large ships to the pipeline is lying in complete negligence.
Although the construction of the infrastructure in the Single Point Mooring or SPM project is scheduled to be completed in 2024, it has not yet been commissioned by appointing an operator. In this infrastructure, six oil tanks, which are enough to store about one month's worth of crude oil and one week's worth of diesel, are lying empty.
According to relevant sources, floating buoys, a 220-kilometer pipeline for transportation and a storage tank for storing two hundred thousand tons of oil are being built in the Bay of Bengal to directly unload fuel oil imported from abroad. If this infrastructure can be fully utilized, about 8 billion taka can be saved annually in unloading and transporting oil at sea. Although the entire infrastructure is ready for this, the huge infrastructure has been lying idle for almost two years due to the inability to appoint an operation and maintenance contractor.
Energy experts say, at this time of the ongoing oil crisis, if oil could be unloaded in the pipeline, both time and money would have been saved during the oil crisis. At the same time, if the oil storage capacity could be utilized, additional benefits would have been obtained during the crisis.
Sources said that this Single Point Mooring or SPM project, built to transport fuel oil from Matarbari in Cox's Bazar to Eastern Refinery Limited (ERL) in Chattogram through the seabed, is not being launched as any operator has not been appointed. The project has practically become idle.
Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) officials said that the work on the Single Point Mooring or SPM project was completed two and a half years ago. The pipeline has reached the storage tank of Eastern Refinery Limited (ERL) in Patenga in Chattogram through the seabed. Two types of fuel oil, refined and crude, will be brought through this pipeline from oil tankers. After the completion of the project work, the pipeline was commissioned in stages. But due to complications in hiring an operator for operation at the last minute, various equipment including pipeline equipment have been idle.
The operator hiring process became complicated after the change of government on August 5. On January 2, the previously approved operator hiring process was canceled in a meeting of the Cabinet Division. According to the sources, fuel transportation under the seabed will start as soon as the operator hiring is completed.
A responsible official of the oil company Padma said that the SPM project being closed for a day means a huge loss of money. Since the SPM project is not fully operational, oil is being unloaded by lightering at the outer anchorage of the Chattogram port. This has stalled BPC's initiative to save Tk 800 crore annually.
According to experts, if initiatives had been taken to form a management structure including hiring an operator during the construction work, it would have been possible to start fuel transportation immediately after the project was launched. Such a situation has been created due to the inefficiency and lack of foresight of the relevant policymakers, including Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC). Regarding the project, Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Iqbal Hasan Mahmud Tuku recently said, "As a people's government, we are working with public interest as our priority. This project is also being analyzed with great importance. We will try to see how it can be beneficial."
Bd-pratidin English/Lutful Hoque
