Bangladesh to Build Pipeline for Chevron Gas

Bangladesh will build a 100km pipeline to carry natural gas from three Chevron-operated fields in the northeast of the country.

Petrobangla chairman Mohammad Hussain Monsur told Reuters that the company decided to build the pipeline at a cost of $150m following Chevron’s announcement that production at the Moulavi Bazar, Jalalabad and Bibiyana gas fields will be more than doubled to 1.84 billion cubic feet a day.

The increased production will be available by the end of 2012, according to Monsur.

To accelerate the completion of the project the country will avoid seeking funds from the World Bank or other multilateral financing agencies and pay for the project itself, he added.

Bangladesh faces up to 400 million cubic feet of gas shortages a day, with the authorities supplying at best about two billion cubic feet per day, according to Reuters.