State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid has expressed Bangladesh's interest to import more petroleum at an affordable price from India. He conveyed this while making a courtesy call on India's Minister of Petroleum, Natural Gas and Housing, Urban Affairs Hardeep Puri in Delhi.   During the meeting they discussed various issues related to mutual interest. The Power Division issued a press release in this regard. Nasrul Hamid discussed diesel import, India-Bangladesh friendship pipeline, Engineers India Limited (EIL), increasing energy cooperation, exchange of experience, training and human resource development, LNG import, offshore gas exploration etc with the Indian minister. Read more: Fuel import from India through pipeline to start from 2023: PM He also discussed the overall situation of the energy sector in Bangladesh.  The Indian minister invited Nasrul Hamid to the India Energy Week scheduled for next February. He said that India will work closely with Bangladesh in the area of energy cooperation.  “If Bangladesh wants to open the energy market, India will extend necessary cooperation,” he said, adding that modernization of petroleum institutes and development of human resources can be done together. Among others, Power Secretary Md. Habibur Rahman, BPDB Chairman Md. Mahbubur Rahman and High Commissioner of Bangladesh Md. Mostafizur Rahman were present during the meeting. Read more: “Assurance of getting oil, gas from India big accomplishment of recent visit”

Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on Sunday (November 13, 2022) sought fuel from Saudi Arabia, with a deferred payment schedule. She made the request while the Deputy Minister of Interior of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia Dr Nasser bin Abdulaziz Al Dawood called on her at her official residence Ganabhaban. Read more: Bangladesh wants to import petroleum from KSA at lower price: Nasrul PM’s press secretary briefed reporters after the meeting. He said that Bangladesh's Prime Minister sought cooperation in oil supply from Saudi Arabia with a deferred payment schedule. Read more: Saudi Arabia assures assistance in commercial supply of LNG to Bangladesh

The government is working to revise the “Renewable Energy Policy of Bangladesh 2008” to make it more effective in the changed energy and power sector scenario. Official sources said, Sustainable and Renewable Energy Development Authority (Sreda), the focal organization under Power Division of the government, has already appointed a consultant. The consultant – Development Technical Consultants Pvt. Ltd (DTCL) – has started reviewing the existing renewable energy policy, REPB-2008, and organize focus group discussion for stakeholders. Read:Govt deliberately pursuing import-dependent energy policy: Speakers According to renewable energy industry insiders, the first meeting of the stakeholders will be held on September 20 in Sreda office. The consultant firm convened the meeting on behalf of Sreda where it will make a presentation on the existing policy and seek opinions of the stakeholders to update it in a national and global changed scenario, said an industry insider. He said the initiative have come from the government as a follow-up of its statements to 26th meeting of the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26), held in Scotland, United Kingdom, from October 31 to November 13 2021.   Read: Experts for reining in energy corruption, exploration of alternative sources In the COP26 meeting, Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in written statement said: “We are also working for a more sustainable energy mix. We hope to have 40% of our energy from renewable sources by 2041”. She also said, “Recently we submitted an ambitious and updated NDC (Nationally Determined Contributions) to the UNFCCC. We have cancelled 10 coal-based power plants worth 12 billion dollars of foreign investment. Currently, as per Sreda statistics, the country generates about 911 MW (solar 677 MW, hydro 230 MW and others 2 MW) while the total power generation is more than 25,000 MW which shows the renewable energy’s share is less than 4 percent. Read: Patience can help overcome crisis in energy sector: Nasrul The recent crisis in primary fuels is another reason behind the move, said a Sreda official. State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid, recently at a function, said that among other options of renewable energy, solar power has huge potential for Bangladesh. But since it requires substantial land allocation, it needs an innovative solution. He also said Bangladesh is now promoting the options of rooftop and floating solar panels and net metering system has been introduced to popularise the use of solar power. Read Huawei Technologies intends to support RMG industry in renewable energy “There is a good opportunity to work on wind power as well,” he said, adding that wind mapping has been completed for 9 potential sites and feasibility will be conducted on the potential for offshore wind power. Private investors in renewable energy sector welcomed the Sreda initiative to review the renewable energy policy and bring necessary amendments to promote non-conventional energy sources. Dipal Barua, president of Bangladesh Solar and Renewable Energy Association (BSREA), termed the initiative “time befitting.” Read TEI GET to promote renewable energy in Bangladesh He said despite a huge potential, the country could not utilize it due to lack of proper action plan. Munawar Moin, Vice President of BSREA and President of Solar Module Manufacturers Association of Bangladesh (SMAB), said the government should introduce a policy under which the local solar industry could utilise their full potentials. Cost of solar energy decreased substantially and has created a huge scope for investment in mega projects, he said. Read Green Economy in Bangladesh: Prospects and Challenges

Joko Widodo, President of Indonesia, is contemplating buying Russian oil to ease the burden of rising energy prices. In an interview with the Financial Times, Widodo said, “We always monitor all of the options. If there is the country (and) they give a better price, of course,” Widodo raised the price of subsidised fuel by 30% earlier this month, citing financial concerns as the reason for the price increase. Read: Indonesia hikes fuel prices by 30%, cuts energy subsidies Thousands of protestors gathered last week in Jakarta and other major cities to condemn the government’s decision to reduce fuel subsidies. The 270 million-strong nation was rocked by demonstrations after the decision. However, any decision to buy Russian crude oil at a price higher than the G7-agreed price cap could result in US penalties against Indonesia. Sandiaga Uno, Indonesia’s minister of tourism, claimed in August that Indonesia had received a 30% discount on Russian petroleum. The nation’s state-owned oil corporation, Pertamina, then declared that it was examining the risks of acquiring Russian oil. Read: Special Presidential Envoy for Climate Kerry to visit Greece, Indonesia, Vietnam Due to rising food costs, Indonesia, the largest economy in Southeast Asia, reported annual inflation of 4.7% in August.

Commerce Minister Tipu Munshi on Saturday said Indian businesses have expressed their interest in investing in some sectors like fuel, transport and agro processing in Bangladesh. He said this while responding to queries from journalists at his residence on Central Road in Rangpur city. Minister Munshi said the Indian investors expressed the interest and sought cooperation while holding meeting with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina during her a four day state visit in the neighbouring country. Upon the discussion, the premier also assured them of offering of all sorts of cooperation in doing business, he said. Terming the prime minister’s visit as effective, he said the Indian Adani Group proposed to invest Tk 4,000 crore to the Bangladesh. “Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi also sought Bangladesh beside it to go ahead,” the minister said.  He hoped that the Tessta water sharing deal will be done within a short time as a positive response from the West Bengal came in this regard – although he didn’t Replying to a question, the commerce minister said the price of soybean oil will be decreased one more step after adjusting with the global market soon. Read: Govt doing its best to rein in prices of essential commodities: PM Munshi also said that prices of essential commodities will be cut as initiatives have been taken to export food gains from countries including Russia and Ukraine. Elaborating the government measures, he claimed that ten million people of the country have been enjoying cheap rates of essential commodities through Trading Corporation of Bangladesh across the country.

NASA’s new moon rocket sprang another dangerous fuel leak Saturday, forcing launch controllers to call off their second attempt to send a crew capsule into lunar orbit with test dummies. The first attempt earlier in the week was also marred by escaping hydrogen, but those leaks were elsewhere on the 322-foot (98-meter) rocket, the most powerful ever built by NASA. Launch director Charlie Blackwell-Thompson and her team tried to plug Saturday’s leak the way they did the last time: stopping and restarting the flow of super-cold liquid hydrogen in hopes of removing the gap around a seal in the supply line. They tried that twice, in fact, and also flushed helium through the line. But the leak persisted. Blackwell-Thompson finally halted the countdown after three to four hours of futile effort. THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below. CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.  (AP) — NASA's new moon rocket sprang another hazardous leak Saturday, as the launch team began fueling it for liftoff on a test flight that must go well before astronauts climb aboard. For the second time this week, the launch team began loading nearly 1 million gallons of fuel into the 322-foot (98-meter) rocket, the most powerful ever built by NASA. Monday’s attempt was halted by a bad engine sensor and leaking fuel. As the sun rose, an over-pressure alarm sounded and the tanking operation was briefly halted, but no damage occurred and the effort resumed. But minutes later, hydrogen fuel began leaking from the engine section at the bottom of the rocket. NASA halted the operation, while engineers scrambled to plug what was believed to be a gap around a seal in the supply line. The countdown clocks continued ticking toward an afternoon liftoff; NASA had two hours Saturday to get the rocket off. NASA wants to send the crew capsule atop the rocket around the moon, pushing it to the limit before astronauts get on the next flight. If the five-week demo with test dummies succeeds, astronauts could fly around the moon in 2024 and land on it in 2025. People last walked on the moon 50 years ago. Forecasters expected generally favorable weather at Kennedy Space Center, especially toward the end of the two-hour afternoon launch window. On Monday, hydrogen fuel escaped from elsewhere in the rocket. Technicians tightened up the fittings over the past week, but launch director Charlie Blackwell-Thompson stressed that she wouldn't know whether everything was tight until Saturday's fueling. Read: NASA scrubs launch of new moon rocket after engine problem Even more of a problem on Monday, a sensor indicated one of the rocket's four engines was too warm, but engineers later verified it actually was cold enough. The launch team planned to ignore the faulty sensor this time around and rely on other instruments to ensure each main engine was properly chilled. Before igniting, the main engines need to be as frigid as the liquid hydrogen fuel flowing into them at minus-420 degrees Fahrenheit (minus-250 degrees Celsius). If not, the resulting damage could lead to an abrupt engine shutdown and aborted flight. Mission managers accepted the additional risk posed by the engine issue as well as a separate problem: cracks in the rocket's insulating foam. But they acknowledged other problems — like fuel leaks — could prompt yet another delay. That didn't stop thousands from jamming the coast to see the Space Launch System rocket soar. Local authorities expected massive crowds because of the long Labor Day holiday weekend. The $4.1 billion test flight is the first step in NASA's Artemis program of renewed lunar exploration, named after the twin sister of Apollo in Greek mythology. Twelve astronauts walked on the moon during NASA’s Apollo program, the last time in 1972. Artemis — years behind schedule and billions over budget — aims to establish a sustained human presence on the moon, with crews eventually spending weeks at a time there. It's considered a training ground for Mars.    

Fuel prices increased by about 30% across Indonesia on Saturday after the government reduced some of the costly subsidies that have kept inflation in Southeast Asia’s largest economy among the world’s lowest. Indonesians have been fretting for weeks about a looming increase in the price of subsidized Pertalite RON-90 gasoline sold by Pertamina, the state-owned oil and gas company. Long lines of motorbikes and cars snaked around gas stations as motorists waited for hours to fill up their tanks with cheaper gas before the increase took effect on Saturday. The hike — the first in eight years — raised the price of gasoline from about 51 cents to 67 cents per liter and diesel fuel from 35 cents to 46 cents. President Joko Widodo said the decision to increase the fuel prices was his last option as the country’s energy subsidy had tripled this year to 502 trillion rupiah ($34 billion) from its original budget, triggered by rising global prices of oil and gas. “The government has tried its best as I really want fuel prices to remain affordable,” Widodo told a televised address announcing the fuel hike. “The government has to make decisions in difficult situations.” He said that the flow of subsidies to the public was not well targeted — about 70% of subsidies were benefiting middle and upper classes — and the government decided instead to increase social assistance. Finance Minister Sri Mulyani Indrawati said authorities were monitoring the impact on inflation and economic growth of the rise in fuel price. Inflation has been relatively modest with the shock being mostly absorbed through a budget bolstered by energy subsidies. Inflation hit 4.6% in August as Bank Indonesia, the central bank, has said it would reassess the inflation outlook in response to the government fuel price policy. Read: Strong undersea quake causes panic in western Indonesia Indrawati said in a separate news conference that the government would provide 150,000 rupiah ($10) cash handouts to cushion the impact of the fuel price increase on 20.6 million poor families until the year end. The total cost of the handouts will be 12.4 trillion rupiah, which will be reallocated from the budget for energy subsidies. She said the government will also spend 9.6 trillion rupiah ($644 million) on salary assistance to about 16 million low paid workers, and 2.17 trillion rupiah ($145 million) will go to subsidizing transport costs, particularly for motorcycle taxi drivers and fishermen. “We hope this can reduce pressure of rising prices and help reduce poverty,” Indrawati said. The government has subsidized fuel for decades in Indonesia, the vast archipelago nation of more than 270 million people. Fuel prices are a politically sensitive issue that could trigger other price hikes and risk student protests. In 1998, an increase in prices sparked riots that helped topple longtime dictator Suharto.

State-owned Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) will analyse the impact of the recent duty cut on diesel import and withdrawal of advance income tax before taking any decision on possible decrease in the price of the fuel, said its Chairman ABM Azad on Monday. “We hope, we can complete our analysis within 2-3 days and send our finding to the ministry to take a final decision on any possible adjustment in diesel price”, he told reporters on Monday following a meeting with petrol pump owners. His comments came a day after the government cut the duty on diesel import by half to five per cent and abolished all advance taxes on its import.   The changes were notified through a gazette notification issued by the National Board of Revenue on Sunday. The order came into effect immediately and will remain effective until the end of (December 31) this year. The NBR notification added that light and high speed diesel oils will get the new facilities. Experts in the industry and the transport sectors believe that the new order came against the backdrop of the consistent demand from the politicians and business circles, as well as the common people, following the government’s hike of prices of all petroleum fuels. The government on August 5 announced the largest ever hikes in the price of fuel oil - ranging from 42- 52 per cent – with effect from August 6. At the consumer level, the retail prices of diesel and kerosene went up to Tk114 per litre, up by a whopping 42.5 per cent from Tk 80/litre. Read: Govt to slash fuel price when it goes down globally: Nasrul Hamid Octane price was raised to Tk135 per litre, up an eye-watering 51.7 per cent from Tk 89/litre - again the largest hike on record. Lastly, a litre of petrol was set at Tk130 from at the pump, that used to be Tk 86/litre even just a few hours ago as of writing this report - another 51 per cent hike in one go that has no precedent in independent Bangladesh. Bangladesh annually imports about 6.5 million metric tons of petroleum, of which 5 million metric tons is refined. Of these, the major portion is diesel - mainly consumed by transport, industry and power sector. However, the petroleum price started witnessing a decreasing trend from August 1 after the per barrel crude oil price was recorded to be $130. After that record high, it witnessed a per barrel price below $90. During the hike of fuel prices, it was said by the Energy Division that the state-owned BPC has been running a loss of Tk8,014.51 crore in petroleum fuel sales in the last six months, from February to July. The BPC chairman said that despite price fall in international market, the organisation has to incur a loss of Tk10-12 per litre in diesel. Responding to another question, he said discussion on the import of Russian oil still remains at the primary level and the government is assessing pros and cons of such import.   Earlier, State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid had said that the government would go for readjustment in fuel prices if price in the global market comes down.

The country's petrol pump owners have postponed their token strike planned for August 31 until September 13. The leaders of Bangladesh Dealers, Distributors, Agents and Petrol Pump Owners Association made the announcement following meeting with Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) on Monday. They said the petrol pump owners have deferred the strike at the request of the BPC. “We postponed our strike for 15 days. If our demands are not met by this time, we will observe strike from September 14”, said Nazmul Haque, president of the Petrol Pump Owners Association. Read: Petrol pump owners threaten strike on Aug 31 Earlier on August 24, the association leaders threatened to go on strike on August 31 if their 5-point demands, including raising their sales’ commissions, are not met within next 7 days.   BPC chairman ABM Azad said he would discuss the issue of the petrol pump owners with some other ministries to resolve it.

State Minister for Power, Energy and Mineral Resources Nasrul Hamid has urged all to be patient for a couple of months terming the current energy and gas crisis as temporary. “I can assure you, if and when the prices of petroleum and gas decline in the world market, we will definitely readjust the local price accordingly”, he told a seminar at Biduyt Bhaban in the city on Sunday. “We’re watching the situation closely. Please, be patient for 1-2 months and get united to face the situation. The government will come out of the load shedding by the end of the next month”, he said. He claimed the government was forced to raise the petroleum fuel prices due to the Russia-Ukraine war situation that pushed up the price in the global market. “The effect of the war is everywhere and we’re not out of it”, he said adding,  Forum for Energy Reporters Bangladesh (FERB) and US-based gas company Chevron jointly organised the seminar titled: “Energy Security in Bangladesh: Volatile International Market” on the occasion of National Energy Security Day. With FERB president Shamim Jahangir in the chair, the event was also addressed by senior secretary of the Energy Division Mahbub Hossain, Petrobangla chairman Nazmul Ahsan, eminent energy experts Prof Badrul Imam and Prof M Shamsul Alam. Energy&Power magazine editor Mollah Amzad Hossain made a keynote presentation. FERB executive director Rishan Nasrullah conducted the function. Nasrul blasted the opposition BNP for criticising the government over the rising petroleum prices, gas crisis and cuts in electricity supply. “When they were in power the BNP did nothing but plundered the state's wealth. That’s why they became champions in corruption”, he said adding, the people had to experience load shedding for 16-17 hours a day at that time. He also said that BNP had rejected an offer from India to allow construction of a pipeline to take gas from Myanmar to India through Bangladesh. Read: Power crisis will not last long: Nasrul Hamid “If that gas line was constructed, we would have got gas from Myanmar at a cheaper rate”, he said.    The state minister also blamed the energy experts for wrongly advising the government for which it could not offer foreign oil companies to explore in the offshore areas of the country. “A number of geologists and experts worked with us and they suggested that it would be better to import LNG as exploration may take longer to get gas from our offshore areas”, he added.     He, however, said three foreign companies including US-based ConocoPhillips were awarded contracts to explore gas in offshore areas. “But at one stage they left the gas blocks saying that gas production would not be economically viable as they found gas elsewhere at cheaper cost”, he claimed. Senior energy secretary Mahbub Hossain said the government has taken up a plan to drill 46 wells which will add gas production by 6118 million cubic feet by 2025. Petrobangla chairman Nazmul Ahsan said the government has appointed a foreign consultant to go for international bidding to explore gas in offshore areas. “We hope we will get its report and an international tender will be floated by December this year for gas exploration in the bay”, he added. Prof Badrul Imam said the problems in the energy sector now widened in branches and sub-branches due to lack of initiative for gas exploration in recent decades. He said Myanmar discovered a huge quantity of gas in its Rakhaine state in the last 10 years. “But Bangladesh could not explore gas at the adjacent gas block-11, located within our territory despite huge potentials. The answer to this question is essential as to why we failed to do the exploration in our areas”, he said. M Shamsul Alam said Bangladesh Energy Regulatory Commission (BERC) is the legal authority to set the petroleum fuel price like it does for natural gas and LPG. “But the Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) set the petroleum prices defying the law which has no accountability”, he said, adding an independent audit should be conducted in the accounts of the organisation to check its corruption.