The Egyptian Natural Gas holding company (EGAS) stopped importing gas to several plants for use as fertiliser last week, due to the late delivery of the liquefied natural gas (LNG) shipment from the Norwegian Hoegh Gasification ship to Ain Sokhna.
The plants EGAS suspended shipment to are: MOPCO, Al-Masriya 1 and 2, Helwan, Alexandria, and APEC.
The gas shipment will arrive Tuesday, although it was supposed to arrive last week. An EGAS official said the late delivery is due to bad weather and pumping gas into fertiliser factories will be gradually resumed starting 7 April.
He added that 200m cubic feet of gas is imported daily to be pumped to both Talkha fertiliser factory and Abu Qir factory, which are subject to the general business sector, while the total contracted quantities of the fertiliser factories reaches 510m cubic feet.
The official noted that the first gasification ship for Hoegh was completed in March, and it started to gradually supply the national network, adding that LNG provides 500m cubic feet per day for one week.
550m cubic feet will be provided daily through the current import until the arrival of the gas shipment and it will be linked to the gasification ship and supply the national network after it is converted, according to the official.
He noted that the power stations’ consumption reached 2.65bn on a daily basis and 23,000 tonnes of oil, despite cool weather temperatures. The Ministry of Electricity lowered the dependency on oils to operate the power stations.
He said that 1.2bn cubic feet is distributed daily to houses, cars, and low consumption- industries consumers.
El-Tebeen iron factory receives 40m cubic feet every day while 60m cubic feet is pumped into Helwan, Al-Qawmeya, Al-Katameya companies for cement.
EGAS decided to stop pumping gas into cement factories and to switch its operation to using oil. The company’s total contracts reached 430m cubic feet daily.
The official said Egypt produces 3.85bn cubic feet of gas daily, compared to 4.2bn feet last in 2015, due to the shortage in producing natural gas.
