Problems of Ordinary Man

Nearly 20 million people live in mega city Karachi. At an average an adult travels more than 25 kilometers a day. Which includes students, factory workers, white collar employees, executives, sales persons, and marketing persons. They have to travel long distances twice a day. Since the normal working hours stretch from 9.00am to 6.00pm, and public transports are usually overloaded and roads are jammed during peak traffic hours. In the absence of decent public transport systems millions of people are forced to use their own motorcycles and cars, which is the main cause of huge oil import bill and growing use of CNG.

Around the world provision of public transport is the responsibility of government. If any government does not wish to get involved, it offers incentives to the private sector. As against this public transport in general and in Karachi in particular is highly insufficient and dilapidated vehicles can be seen plying on the roads, which are also overloaded. Therefore, the individuals are forced to use personal transport i.e. motorcycles and cars. Besides, hundreds of contract carriers operate in the city carrying commuters to their destinations.

Nearly 20 million people live in mega city Karachi. At an average an adult travels more than 25 kilometers a day. The commuters include students, factory workers, white collar employees and executives. They have to travel long distances twice a day. Since the normal working hours stretch from 9.00am to 6.00pm public transport is overloaded and roads are jammed during peak traffic hours. In the absence of decent public transport systems millions of people are forced to use their own motorcycles and cars, which is the main cause of huge oil import bill and growing use of CNG.

Around the world provision of public transport is the responsibility of government. If any government does not wish to get involved, it offers incentives to the private sector. As against this public transport in general and in Karachi in particular is highly inadequate and dilapidated vehicles can be seen plying on the roads, which are also overloaded. Therefore, the individuals are forced to use personal transport i.e. motorcycles and cars. Besides, hundred of contract carriers operate in the city carrying commuters to their destinations.
To begin with, disallowing use of CNG in vehicles will add to oil import bill. However, the point to remember is that CNG stations use less than 10% of total gas consumed in the country. Therefore, permanent ban on use of CNG would hardly make any difference. Even larger quantities can be saved by containing gas pilferage estimated around 300mmcfd which is almost close to total gas being supplied to fertilizer plants by SNGPL.

It is necessary to remind the policy planners that all sectors except power plants are a major source of cash for gas marketing companies. Reportedly, KESC alone owes around Rs35 billion to SSGC. While there are huge payables KESC also fails in paying current bills. Therefore, asking SSGC to continue to supply gas to KESC is a zero sum game. Another point of concern is that KESC is adding around 600MW generation capacity which can only be run on gas. There is also a general impression that KESC has refused to operate its power plants on furnace oil and as and when its gas supply goes down it immediately resort to load shedding.

During recent closure of CNG stations in Karachi it became evident that over the years more than 70% of mini buses and also a substantial percentage of buses have installed CNG kits. Another problem is that like passenger cars these vehicles can't operate on diesel as well as CNG, once converted to CNG these vehicles can't be operated on diesel. Over the years operators of public transport have been ripping off passengers, as fares were set on the basis diesel price but vehicles were actually operated on CNG. A surprising point is that the authorities responsible for issuing 'fitness certificates' also didn't bother to inform the concerned authorities about gradual switch over of public transport to CNG from diesel.

Crude oil price is likely to hover above US$100/barrel in medium to long term. Therefore, if the government is serious in containing use on CNG, efforts have to be made to use bio-fuel (alcohol blended in motor gasoline and canola/corn oil added in diesel). Since alcohol and canola/corn fall under the category of 'indigenous and renewable sources of energy' their use will not add to the import bill of Pakistan. In fact the added advantage will be an increase in the production of sugarcane, canola and corn.

It is believed that 'oil import lobby' is the biggest opponent of introduction of bio-fuels in Pakistan. It is being said that use of bio-fuels will inflate prices of sugar and edible oil in the country, which is totally incorrect. Till today canola and corn oils can't be added to diesel because of being more expensive. Therefore, production and yield per acre of canola/corn seeds have to be increased significantly to bring down prices of these oils.

However, to begin with government should focus on production/sale of E-10 (motor gasoline containing 10% alcohol). Almost all the sugar mills have attached distilleries which can deliver the required quantity of alcohol as bulk of molasses (basic raw material for producing alcohol) is being exported. The added advantage is that no alteration has to be made in the carburetors of cars for using E-10.


as seen on magtheweekly