Pakistan Looking to Set Up Five More LNG Terminals

Pakistan is looking to set up five more terminals at Gwadar and Karachi ports for handling, regasification, storage, treatment and processing of LNG it plans to import in coming years, Dawn reported November 20 quoting government officials.

According to the newspaper report, if the proposal goes through two LNG terminals would come up at Gwadar and three at Karachi.

Pakistan already has a floating storage and regasification unit (FSRU), called Exquisite, which started operations in March 2015 at Port Qasim, Karachi, chartered out by US shipowner Excelerate to local firm Engro. Pakistan's second import terminal (FSRU), to be supplied by shipowner BW Gas, is due to be commissioned, also at Port Qasim, by June 2017.

FSRU Exquisite at Port Qasim (Credit: Excelerate)

With a severe shortage of energy for the domestic economy, Pakistan has shifted focus to importing LNG to meet the deficit. Both state-owned and private firms have signed long term deals with Qatar this year. Work on building sufficient import infrastructure is also been taken up.

The government has on many occasions said that LNG will now be a very important part of country’s energy mix.

Shardul Sharma