South Africa's state-owned logistics utility Transnet on Thursday lashed out at oil giant BP Africa for its call to have Transnet's pipeline tariffs revisited.

Transnet said in a statement mailed late on Thursday that it finds BP Africa's statement on pipeline tariffs "highly irresponsible, unhelpful and misleading".

BP Africa on Wednesday called a rare media conference to present its arguments against the proposed tariff increase on the use of the existing Durban-to-Gauteng petroleum product pipeline.

According to Transnet's application to the National Energy regulator of South Africa (Nersa), the increase in tariff was necessary to help cover the cost of the construction of a planned R12.3-billion new multiproduct pipeline between the coast and Johannesburg and Pretoria.

Seen as forming the backbone of fuel supply infrastructure to Gauteng and other parts of the inland market for the next 50 years, the new pipeline is scheduled to start carrying product from the latter half of 2010.

But BP Africa warned that implementation of the proposal would have dire consequences for the South African economy.

It said while the increase in pipeline capacity from the coast to inland was crucial given, the proposed 300 percent tariff increase on the existing line will have a major negative impact both on the oil industry and on Gauteng's economy.

Damaging the petroleum industry irreversibly, the awarding of the tariffs could also cost the country 21,614 jobs not only in the petroleum industry but across the economy.

It would also skew competition in the industry, argued BP Africa, which said inland refiners would benefit from what effectively translates into windfall revenue.

Calling BP Africa's move an "unfortunate attack" on the parastatal, Transnet said the argument was nothing more than a proxy for BP Africa's long-standing complaint regarding its relative position arising out of a locational disadvantage in relation to the inland refiners.

"At the outset, we must make clear that petroleum pipeline tariffs are set by Nersa, and Transnet's revenue requirement application is consistent with the Petroleum Pipelines Act, the Regulations made there under and Nersa's tariff methodology which allows for the recovery of costs," Transnet said.

Transnet said it has proposed to Nersa that the recovery of the required revenue should be spread equitably across all the users of the petroleum pipeline network.

"However, this decision lies with Nersa and should any stakeholder be aggrieved by the structure of tariffs, such a matter should be taken up with Nersa," it said.