Energy Bangla

The Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation on Monday received only two bids for exporting the first consignment of natural-gas condensate — a source of petrol and octane.
BPC floated open tenders on July 16 inviting interested companies to submit the bids by Monday to buy 120,000 barrels or nearly 140,000 tonnes of condensate from Chittagong between August 23 and 25.
The bidders were asked to offer price of the gas condensate in terms of international price of Naphtha, a petroleum product.
Only two foreign companies, Trafigura and Olive, submitted bids on the day although a number of companies had bought the schedule, officials said.
In the bids, Trafigura wanted to buy a barrel of condensate at US$ 0.38 less than the international price of one barrel of Naphtha while Olive wanted US$ 3.95 discount on per barrel price of Naphtha, a BPC official said.
He said that BPC would take a decision in awarding the contract today.
Downturn in crude and refined oil prices in the international market may lead to such a lukewarm response to the tenders, BPC officials said.
The government decided to export the condensate in phases as its production outpaced the demand for the refined products — petrol and octane — of condensate from gas fields.
Gas condensate, liquid petroleum that comes with raw natural gas during extraction, is refined into petrol and octane at refineries.
Petrobangla, the state-run Oil, Gas and Mineral Resources Corporation, is set to export the excess gas condensate through the BPC.
At present, 12 refineries, four in the public sector and the rest private, process the current supply of condensate extracted from the country’s 21 gas fields and sell them to BPC’s marketing companies. The private refineries are also allowed to import condensate to refine into petroleum products.
The country’s annual production of condensate increased by over 70 per cent, mainly after Chevron Bangladesh set up a liquid recovery unit at Bibiyana gas field towards the end of 2014.
In the 2013-14 financial year, the state-owned and international oil companies extracted some 321,000 tonnes of condensate, and the quantity increased to 360,000 tonnes the following fiscal year.
Energy division estimated the extraction of condensate would rise to 560,000 tonnes in the ongoing fiscal 2015-16.
The country’s demand for petrol and octane, however, remained stuck at less than 350,000 tonnes per annum due to use of compressed natural gas or CNG, in private cars, pickup vans, buses and auto rickshaws, in the big cities, including Dhaka, Sylhet and Chittagong, a BPC official said.
Mostly motorbikes and private cars run on petrol and octane.
Now the public and private sector operators of 21 gas fields can supply over 1,330 tonnes of condensate a day, of which Chevron alone can supply about 1,000 tonnes from the Bibiyana field.