White Oil Pipeline to be completed by first quarter of 2019

Shell says it will help company’s supply chain; will have capacity of 12m tons

SHEIKHUPURA: The new White Oil Pipeline (WOP) will be completed by the first quarter of 2019, which will help strengthen the company’s supply chain process, said Shell Pakistan Limited Managing Director Jawwad Cheema.

Once completed, the pipeline will have a capacity of 12 million tons of transporting oil from the port city to Machike, a hub of oil depots situated in central Punjab.



He further said that the company has decided to make significant investments of Rs5.5 billion besides this project.

“SPL is the largest private shareholder of the multi-grade conversion WOP and the project is the need of the hour for the country’s growing oil demands besides improving the safety standards of oil supply chain,” Cheema said in an inaugural ceremony of inducting 100 new state-of-the-art oil tankers in the company’s fleet at Shell terminal Machike, Sheikhupura on Saturday.

These huge investments come after last year’s incident of Ahmedpur Sharqia.

Last year, an explosion occurred after an oil tanker toppled near Ahmepur Sharkia, and the company’s management decided to induct new oil tankers to its fleet.



Soon after the incident, Shell engineers worked with an OEM in China to develop enhanced tank lorry designs that comply with the country’s, international and Oil and Gas Regulatory Authority’s (OGRA) required fleet standards.

“The company’s sales dropped substantially after the tragic incident as the company removed all trucks from its supply chain, which were not meeting the safety standard,” he said.

“Our marketing share dropped to 11% from 18% due to that incident. Since then the company has been working to improve the safety standards of lorries.”

On a question about the oil terminal in Gwadar, Cheema mentioned that the government of Pakistan was evolving policy for oil city in Gwadar. Once the government will announce the policy, the private sector will come there to invest.



SPL External Affairs Manager Habib Haider said that the multi-grade conversion of the WOP will significantly reduce primary movement of fuel by road.

Published in The Express Tribune, June 24^th, 2018.

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