LAHORE: With a considerable dip in mercury levels, various parts of Lahore, especially the tail-end ones, have started facing extremely low gas pressure at several times of the day. The situation is gradually worsening, evident from the fact that the Sui Northern Gas Pipelines (SNGPL) has ñnalised a plan to distribute liqueñed petroleum gas (LPG) cylinders on reasonable prices to all those facing the issue.

`With winter heading towards its peak, gas supply in our area is falling gradually, deplored a consumer in Gulberg. `We are witnessing low gas pressure from 11am to evening. Af ter 10pm, the supply is completely suspended daily by the SNGPL,` Shakeel, a resident of Gulberg, told Dawn on Friday.

Akram, a resident of Township, also com-plained of gas `load shedding` at night and that the situation was getting worse by the day with the weather getting colder. `We are experiencing low gas pressure all day, he told Dawn.

However, an SNGPL of ficial dispelled the impression, claiming gas supply was smooth in majority areas.

`The company has been asked to provide gas to domestic consumers for eight hours daily. But even then we are supplying it for 12 hours,` he claimed.

He said the situation in the tail-end areas was better than last year, adding the old 32km pipelines had been replaced in several areas of the city. `There could be a few localities where the consumers are facing low pressure these days,` he admitted.Keeping in view the gas shortage due to depleting ingenious reserves, the SNGPL had in October entered into an agreement with the Sui Southern LPG Limited (SLL) to provide LPG cylinders to all those facing low pressure or anyone seeking such a service in Lahore and other parts of Punjab.

The SSL, a subsidiary of the Sui Southern Gas Company Limited, has been already facilitating consumers in Sindh and Balochistan.

According to the company, the cylinders would only be supplied to domestic consumers and it has already identified up to one million households facing pressure-related issues.

A majority of the seven million consum-ers the SNGPL covers in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is domestic. For many years, it has been facing a shortage of gas due to depleting indigenous reserves and increasing demand.

According to another of ficial, since the SNGPL introduced LPG as an alternate fuel in line with the government`s directions to diversify the company`s business and ensure supply to consumers, it has distributed 100,000 cylinders in Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Lahore, Peshawar, Multan, Faisalabad and Gujranwala.

`The response is very good as the company is receiving a number of requests for LPG cylinders from the consumers,` the officialclaimed.-Khalid Hasnain