Senators criticize Khududgaztaminot for shortcomings in natural gas supply to the population

On October 30, a meeting of the Senate Committee on Defense and Security was held. It discussed the results of a parliamentary inquiry sent to the Cabinet of Ministers on the state of the natural gas pipeline system.

At the meeting, the chairman of the Senate Committee on Defense and Security Kutbiddin Burkhonov listed a number of problems with gas supply to the population.

“Today, Khududgaztaminot JSC has a total of 89,172.1 km of gas pipelines in the country, of which 20,525.3 km have been used for 10 years, 25,729.2 km – for 10-25 years and 42,917.5 km – for 25–30 years or more.

This means that the central system pipes have not been replaced for so many years. What is the reason for this? The population has been paying for gas for so long, and the BCE has confiscated the assets of those who did not pay off the debt,” Burkhonov said.

The senator told about the incident in the Urta Chirchik district, Tashkent region.

“When we visited the Urta Chirchik district, an old woman came to me and said: “Come closer and get a whiff of this, we all smell like manure. We burn dung as we have no gas. Check any housing, it is the same here everywhere,” she said.

We meet with thousands of people. They say there are pipes. People used to have gas, but now there is nothing. Although you know very well that those people have no natural gas supply for years, you say “if there is a shortage of gas, we will supply liquefied gas, there is a norm of 20 kg.” If?” Burkhonov addressed to the officials of Kududgaztaminot.

According to him, only 68.4 km of gas pipelines were completely repaired and 49.2 km were reconstructed by Khududgaztaminot JSC in 2020. Currently, of the 2,117 electrochemical protection stations envisaged in the main gas pipeline projects under Uztransgaz JSC, only 1,097 are in working condition, and 761 do not meet the requirements at all.

“Unfortunately, at a time when it is not possible to replace 25-30-year-old gas pipelines, no measures have been taken to preserve the existing ones.

As a result of reducing the technical staff in the regions, timely maintenance of gas adjustment points is not provided. Inspections are carried out poorly. Due to the failure of most gas adjustment points, there are many natural gas losses in the country’s gas system. As a result, billions are being lost from the state budget,” Kutbiddin Burkhonov said.

It was added that the material-technical base of the city and district branches of Khududgaztaminot JSC is not fully equipped with modern equipment and special machinery. As a result, accidents in the country’s gas system are not eliminated in a timely manner.

For information, by the October 12, 2019 decision of the Senate, a parliamentary inquiry was sent to the government on the state of the natural gas pipeline system and the implementation of legislation in this area. According to senators, the issues raised in this inquiry were not properly addressed.

The Committee decided to submit a proposal to the Senate Council to include in the agenda of the next plenary session the issue of hearing the report of the Deputy PM.