The single point mooring project at Cox's Bazar's Moheshkhali released 60,000 tonnes of diesel in the first 35 hours of its operation, through a pipeline constructed in the deep sea of the Bay of Bengal.

The transport of the diesel imported by the Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) for Eastern Refinery Ltd took place in a period between December 5 to December 7.

The pipeline can transport 2,900 cubic metres of fuel every hour.

The previous method used to take 10 days to transport the same amount of diesel from the mother vessels to the lighter vessels and then to the depot, said Mohammed Lokman, managing director of Eastern Refinery Ltd.

Under the single point mooring project located about 16 km off the Moheshkhali coast of Cox's Bazar, two parallel pipelines have been installed -- one for crude oil and the other for diesel.

The diesel was safely released from the mother vessel to a storage tank constructed at Moheshkhali area, said Sharif Hasnat, director of the project.

With both pipelines functional, the BPC would be able to transport oil directly from other vessels to the storage tanks and save around Tk 800 crore a year, according to the officials of the state-owned petroleum product supplier.