Delhi Grappling With Shortage Of Cng Stations

The country's Capital is gasping for compressed natural gas (CNG). As things stand, it is bound to choke further with each passing day.

To start with, allocation of natural gas to Delhi for conversion to CNG itself falls far short of requirement. CNG vehicle population is growing at an alarming rate of more than 100 per cent a year.

The number of dispensing stations is short by at least 50 per cent. The authorities seem clueless to the solution.

The high-power gas linkage committee, which met here on July 27, did not help ease the situation.

It deferred a decision on allotting more natural gas to Indraprastha Gas Limited (IGL) for distribution of CNG as auto fuel.

 

The committee argued that the total allocation of natural gas ex-Hazira and along HBJ pipeline is around 48.61 million metric standard cubic metres per day (mmscmd) whereas the present availability of gas is in the range of 39-40 mmscmd.

"In the circumstances, any further allotment would mean a pro-rata cut to the existing consumers."

The total firm allocation of IGL is 0.48 mmscmd of natural gas. Of this, 0.15 mmscmd is being used as CNG for automobile sector and the balance for domestic and commercial purposes in the Capital.

Following the Supreme Court order for conversion of all commercial transport vehicles to CNG, IGL has estimated the total vehicle population on CNG, which is around 42,920, will swell to 95,070 by March 2002 and auto CNG demand will increase six-fold in the next seven months -- from the existing 0.15 mmscmd to 0.95 mmscmd by March 2002.

Even if the required quantity of gas is made available to IGL, it may not be possible for it to put up the requisite number of CNG dispensing stations to distribute the gas.

IGL has estimated that the total number of these stations, which is around 75 at present, will have to be increased to 120 by March 2002 if long queues at these stations are to disappear.

IGL is also hamstrung by the usual delays in the import of the dispensing equipment and compressors.

Since all these are imported, their spares have also to be imported resulting in the equipment remaining out of order for days thereby hampering CNG distribution.

Moreover, since the countries from which the imports are made have no autorickshaws, the equipment imported is meant only for buses and cars.

For autos, changes in dispensing equipment and compressors are made locally which fail frequently leading to longer queues of autos awaiting refueling.

The government is looking at various proposals, including price revision of various auto fuels to bridge the gap between them, to overcome the problem.

However, bureaucrats seem firm in their belief that the only way out is to convince the Supreme Court that it should allow some other low-sulphur and led-free fuels to be used in commercial transport vehicles.