Quoting estimates that he said had been kept hidden in the past, he also put the country’s natural gas reserves at 100 trillion cubic feet, compared to previously reported estimate of nearly 29 trillion cubic feet.
What were disclosures to the house came in a speech that Dr Asim said he had to cut short on instructions from the ruling party chief whip while winding up a debate on opposition cut motions on demands for grants in the new budget for the petroleum and natural resources ministry.
A member of the opposition PML-N and a former governor of Balochistan, retired Lt-Gen Abdul Qadir Baloch, told the house in a speech earlier that he had been once briefed about the existence of exploitable tight gas reserves deep under Sui equal to its presently known gas reserves.
The minister confirmed the opposition member’s statement, saying the place has “as much tight gas as in the present Sui field”, and informed the house that exploration work at the site, which is run by Pakistan Petroleum Limited, would begin in three months.
In February, the Council of Common Interests approved a policy for the exploitation of tight gas, which is natural gas reservoirs locked in difficult rock or underground formations extremely “tight” to drill.
Talking about the gas reserves, he said: “We have more than 100 trillion cubic feet,” adding that information about it had been kept hidden in the past and was “brought out by the present government”.
But he did not elaborate why and who had kept this information hidden or clarify whether the estimate included the estimate of tight gas.
Dr Asim also talked about plans for gas exploration at some other blocks in Balochistan despite the bad law and order situation in the province and progress of agreements to buy gas from Iran and Turkmenistan through pipelines yet to be built, he said: “We have a very bright future.”
But he said the “fruit” of these plans might be enjoyed by those “who come after us”.
Then petroleum and natural resources minister Naveed Qamar, in reply to a question in the National Assembly in January last, had put “total balance recoverable” from the country’s gas reserves at 28.9 trillion cubic feet – enough for more than 20 years.
Dr Asim described domestic consumption as “the worst form” of using gas, which he said must go to industry, and informed the house that the government had plans to build its first terminal for the import of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and to have marketing companies supply LPG “in every corner of the country”.
The minister promised to bring a law in the next session of the National Assembly to provide for punishing not only those who steal electricity but also those who help them do it, before the house approved the budgeted demands for grant for his ministry worth more than Rs703 million after rejecting all 33 cut motions mostly moved by PML-N members.
Before that, the house approved much bigger demands for grants worth more than Rs12 billion for the foreign ministry and worth more than Rs4 billion for the information and broadcasting ministry, after rejecting 33 cut motions about the first ministry and 35 about the second.
