Tajikistan is taking measures to ensure the safe usage of natural gas. Tojikstandart (Agency for Standardization, Metrology, Certification and Trade Inspection) has developed a draft technical regulation for safe transportation of natural gas.
The Agency says the technical regulation has been developed for the purpose of protecting life and health of human beings, the environment, life and health of animals and plants as well as for the purpose “of preventing actions misleading natural-gas consumers.”
The draft technical regulation is currently under consideration by the relevant ministries and agencies.
The technical regulation establishes requirements for safety of combustible natural gas prepared for transportation.
It is to be noted that the draft technical regulation developed by Tojikstandart is practically identical to the technical regulation on safety gas adopted by the Council of the Eurasian Economic Union (EEC) in September 2016.
The technical regulation for safety of natural gas prepared for transportation is being developed by Tajik authorities after Uzbekistan resumed natural gas deliveries to Tajikistan. After a six-year hiatus, Uzbekistan began supplying natural gas to Tajikistan in April last year. Last year, Uzbekistan reportedly supplied up to 2 million cubic meters of natural gas to Tajikistan per month at the rate of UA$100.00 per 1,000 cubic meters.
In 2017, the main consumer of Uzbek natural gas was the Tajik aluminum smelter and insignificant amounts of Uzbek natural gas were also supplied to some other Tajik industrial enterprises.
In Tajikistan itself, natural is currently being produced in insignificant amounts (little more than 3 million cubic meters per month) in the southern Khatlon province.
Meanwhile, according to some expert estimates, the aggregate raw-materials resources of the oil and gas bearing areas in Tajikistan amount to about 1,000 billion tons of reference fuel. At the same time, production work at oil and gas fields require considerable expenditure, since hydrocarbon deposits occur at depths ranging from 6.5 to 8 kilometers.
