ISLAMABAD: With receivables of public-sector oil and gas companies exceeding Rs225 billion, upcoming fuel imports for electricity generation appear to be in the doldrums unless federal coffers open up.

A senior petroleum ministry official told Dawn a sudden surge in electricity shortfall over the past week was an indication that fuel stocks were not sufficient and the state-run Pakistan State Oil was not in a position to build the stocks in future.

“In fact, PSO has already written to the federal government that unless payments are made upfront, it will not be in a position to open letters of credit for imports for the February-March period,” he added.

The official said the Jamshoro power plant had to shut down its units last week because its fuel stocks plummeted to just three days of coverage to keep two units running at full capacity, resulting in increase in loadshedding for several hours.

He said the plant did not have a long-term fuel supply contract and required 4000 tons of furnace oil per day.

Moreover, he said, all thermal power stations in the public sector were also running at about 50 per cent capacity because of fuel scarcity. The public sector power plants required 11,000 tons of fuel per day, but they were getting only 8,500 tons, leaving a daily shortfall of 2500 tons.

The official said PSO receivables had exceeded Rs125bn because of short payments by the power sector on a continuous basis, although it had been receiving partial payments. The receivables of gas companies had also surpassed Rs100bn.

In a letter the PSO informed the ministries of petroleum, finance and water and power that the banking sector had stopped extending loans to it because its credit limits had been exhausted while PSO’s own resources and revenue stream from the power sector were not sufficient to open letters of credit for February-March and beyond unless the federal government made some special arrangements.

Another official said the finance ministry was under extreme pressure to ensure at least Rs20-30bn for fuel imports because of a continuous increase in their total receivables which stood at Rs503bn at the end of December.

This is mainly because of worsening of bill recovery process of the distribution companies which had come down to about 65pc from over 80pc a year ago, despite a vigorous campaign against electricity theft and non-payments.