K-P to take up issues of net hydel profit, petroleum rights

Seeks access to real time electricity production, data of oil and gas from well-heads

PESHAWAR: At the 34th Council of Common Interest (CCI) meeting scheduled for Friday (tomorrow), the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (K-P) is going to press for resolution of its pending issues including net hydel profits (NHP), supply of gas, and petroleum rights for its oil and gas company.

Officials dealing with the subject in the K-P government told The Express Tribune on Wednesday that the CCI agenda featured four items related to K-P.

These include the long-pending NHP issue, the supply of natural gas to villages in 5 kilometer radius of the gas producing fields in the province, and award of petroleum rights to the provincial and federal government companies without competitive bidding.



The agenda also include K-P’s demand for access to real time electricity production in the country and real time production data of oil and gas from the well-heads and natural gas consumption in K-P.

According to the officials, the K-P government wants to get petroleum exploration rights in the province for the K-P Oil and Gas Company Limited (KPOGCL).

The petroleum exploration rights are awarded under the Petroleum Policy 2012 either through competitive bidding or without competitive bidding to strategic partner companies on government to government basis.

K-P has proposed that one time relaxation may be allowed for award of one new petroleum exploration block to each of the four provincial holding companies in their respective provinces without competitive bidding.

The officials said the K-P government wanted adoption of AGN Kazi Methodology for calculating the NHP. He said in its 32nd meeting, held on August 25, 2017, the CCI referred the matter to a committee comprising the minister for inter provincial coordination, and the secretary to prime minister and the CCI secretary and asked it to hold meetings with the stakeholders to resolve the issue and submit a report.

The Inter-Provincial Coordination Committee (IPCC) in its 26th meeting dated September 19, 2017 decided that it would recommend request of K-P and Punjab to the CCI for finalisation of the Kazi Committee Methodology Award.

K-P wants to implement the IPCC decision taken at the 26th meeting for finalisation of the Kazi Committee Methodology Award in letter and spirit.

The K-P government also wants its outstanding payment for the fiscal year 2016-17 – amounting to Rs16.82 billion and Rs11 billion of the current year [till October] – released immediately.

The K-P government wants access to real-time electricity production in the country, its usage by distribution companies (DISCOs) and duration of load-shedding on each feeder in the province.

K-P has 13.5% share in daily national production of electricity but the province is not getting its complete share and facing severe load-shedding. Furthermore, the NHP is paid on the basis of units generated in the hydropower stations in K-P but it has no access to the production of electricity.



The K-P government wants the federal government to immediately install the required software in the K-P energy and power department for real-time monitoring of electricity production, allocation to DISCOs and duration of load-shedding on each feeder of K-P.

The IPCC had decided that the Ministry of Water and Power would upload the electricity production on weekly basis on its website but the decision is yet to be implemented.

K-P also wants real-time oil and gas production in the province since it gets oil and gas royalty at the rate of 12.5% of the well-head price. According to documents of the K-P government, presently 14 national and international companies are working in 28 various blocks located in K-P. However, the government lacks mechanism to access the oil and gas production on each well-head in the province.