Gas supply returns to normal after surge in demand due to severe winter conditions

SSGC was efficiently maintaining gas supplies until last month i.e., December but due to sudden cold waves that struck Karachi during the second week of January and the extreme winters hitting Balochistan region, the management immediately took concrete steps for ensuring better gas supplies to its domestic customers that have always been on company’s top priority and on top of the load management plan approved by the Government.

In order to save precious human lives needing to keep their atmosphere warm, the management enhanced gas supplies to Balochistan from 80 mmcfd to 180 mmcfd.

The diversion was managed through limiting the gas supplies to Fertilizer and exercising Sunday closures of Industrial units with captive powers. Whereas, 90 MMSCFD RLNG was arranged to maintain the stability of the system. However, the situation got compounded with short supplies from few gas fields on their technical grounds. This resulted in creating a combined shortfall of 25-30 MMCFD gas, thus bringing tough challenges for the Company as the underground line pack went to an extreme low with a risk of collapsing the system.

SSGC urgently took a few more steps to overcome this shortage by shutting off gas supplies to fertilizer sectors before the scheduled date and introducing a 24-hour gas holiday on Sundays to CNG stations and entire industrial sector including captive power plants.
SSGC’s Managing Director, Mr. Amin Rajput, also contacted some heads of other energy sector organizations seeking their support and was able to bring in additional 3 mmcfd from OGDCL.

The good news is that normal gas supply from all fields has been resumed and additional 6-8 mmcfd gas has been arranged through SSGC’s extra efforts and different arrangements, thus stabilizing the line pack and normalizing the gas pressures. Visible results show vast improvement in gas pressures resulting in better pressures from 5:00 am till 10:00 pm across the city.

It may be noted that due to an annual depletion of gas fields by 8-10%, SSGC gas supplies were reduced to 655 mmcfd as compared to 695 mmcfd that the Company used to get last year. The demand of gas cannot be documented as it keeps fluctuating with the temperatures.

SSGC is making all efforts to maintain uninterrupted domestic supply from 5:00 am till 10:00 pm. Except for these hours, the system is wide open throughout the day without any pressure profiling to ensure uninterrupted supplies of natural gas to the households across the franchise area.

Gas supply position is being monitored continuously by the management and teams are in the field 24/7 to address any low-pressure complaints in the domestic sector. Customers are requested to contact SSGC’s helpline 1199, or lodge their complaints via the Company’s official social media platforms, or via SSGC Mobile application – SSGC Customer Connect.