Dhaka, June 30 (BDNEWS) – The fate of Hydrocarbon Unit under the Energy and Mineral Resources Division of the Ministry of Power, Energy and Mineral Resources is now hanging on the balance as the first phase of a project to run the unit expired Thursday.
The government has not taken any decision yet over the think-tank unit under the Ministry despite a donor agency is ready to finance it for the second phase.
The officials of the unit tried to meet the newly appointed Energy Advisor Mahmudur Rahman Wednesday, but failed due to his other engagements. A meeting to discuss its fate is likely to be held on July 2, according to sources.
Hydrocarbon Unit was established in July 1999 in the ministry with NORAD funding under a technical cooperation agreement with Norwegian Petroleum Directorate to achieve some definite goals and objectives in the energy sector.
Its responsibilities were: reserve and undiscovered resource assessment at regular intervals, data management on oil and gas sector, overview and observation on PSC activities, internal and regional gas market analysis, formulation of exploration and depletion policy, establish contact forums for the private sector and working as the technical arm of the ministry.
Since its inception, the HCU was playing a crucial role in the upstream activities of Bangladesh Petroleum Sector. HCU institutionalised the resource and reserve estimation process in the country by developing a group of expert professionals who are now capable of doing the job on their own.
A mini data bank has been developed in the HCU for energy related data. This data bank contains gas production reserve and resource database, monthly reports were being generated from this database.
As the technical arm to the Energy and Mineral Resources Division, Hydrocarbon Unit used to provide necessary opinion, analyses and information on issues like PSC, gas demand and supply, gas field development, pricing, future planning, legal issues, energy policy and privatisation.
The budget for the phase-I was Tk 131.36 million.
The major issues facing now are to continue HCU activity with the Norwegian Technical Assistance as a project (2nd Phase) to put HCU on a permanent footing. The phase-II has already got 14.80 Million Norwegian Kroner (Tk 1.18 crore).
BDNEWS/2129 hrs
