Petroleum products demand up 2 per cent

THE domestic demand for refined petroleum products is increasing two per cent annually, and BSM is preparing itself to meet the demand with a number of new projects.

Hj Mohd Sufri Hj Sulaiman, managing director of Brunei Shell Marketing Co Sdn Bhd (BSM), while speaking to members of the media yesterday on the sidelines of the launch of its latest project, the "BSM New Tank Project", attributed the annual increase in demand to growing businesses, the increasing number of cars in the Sultanate, and more commercial fleets coming in, along with the number of projects under way in the private sector.

"So over the past five years, we have been more aggressive in sales. The two per cent annual increase in demand has been going on for a long time already," he said.

However, Hj Mohd Sufri said that this is not the only project BSM is working on to meet the increase in demand.

"There are a number of projects we have in the pipeline. We have the expansion on gantry and loading capacity at Muara Terminal with a bigger capacity and better technology. There is also the integration of the jetty to deal with bigger vessels coming in with more importation and also to ensure that the Country Wide Storage (CWS) is properly managed," he said, adding that these are all in the pipeline to ensure that BSM operates efficiently.

As demand is increasing, BSM is working on to better prepare itself for the future.

"Before the demand increases (more), we might as well be prepared to have bigger capacity, and bigger storage. That is the intention of the projects," he said.

The "BSM New Tank Project" was officially launched yesterday, which will boost BSM's CWS from 25 days to 31 days of the Sultanate's consumption.

Each tank will be have a capacity to hold 12,000 cubic metre of refined products.

Hj Mohd Sufri said that one tank would be allocated for diesel, whilst the other would be for Research Octane Number (RON) 97 petrol.

The Brunei Times

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