04-08-2017

IndianOil Board gives its nod for Gujarat refinery expansion

The IndianOil Board, in its meeting on 3rd August 2017, gave Stage-I approval for expansion of the Corporation’s Gujarat Refinery from the existing 13.7 to 18 Million Metric Tonnes Per Annum (MMTPA) of crude oil processing capacity at an estimated cost of Rs. 15,034 crore. The project to augment the Refinery's capacity by 4.3 MMTPA will help meet the growing demand for products in the region.

The highlight of the project will be the proposed upfront execution of a new 15-MMTPA Atmospheric Vacuum Unit (AVU) with associated utilities to replace the 4 Atmospheric Units and 2 Vacuum Units installed at various stages of the refinery's phase-wise capacity expansion starting from 1965. After many years in service and being old in design and small in capacity, these units are no longer energy-efficient.

Execution of the 15-MMTPA AVU in 50 months after Stage-1 approval, ahead of other units by about 11 months, will provide impetus to the total project execution and will accrue significant savings and improved energy efficiency by way of operation of a new, large-size AVU in place of existing small units. The commissioning of the new AVU almost a year ahead of other units, will also help in smooth commissioning and stabilisation of other downstream secondary processing units.

According to Mr. Sanjiv Singh, Chairman, IndianOil, the new refinery configuration proposed will take into account the likely disruptions in the fuel supply/demand scenario in the future and will have built-in flexibility in its operations for strong integration with downstream petrochemical units. “Gujarat Refinery, which went on stream in October 1965 as a 1 MMTPA unit, heralded India’s capabilities to build refineries on its own. In the same vein, we are now proposing to incorporate IndianOil's own R&D technologies for both IndMax and kerosene hydrodesulphurisation units. The IndMax unit is being designed for high yields of propylene, for which a polypropylene (PP) unit of 420 TMTPA capacity is being set up as a downstream petrochemical unit as part of the refinery configuration,” he said. PP is used in a variety of applications, including packaging for consumer products, plastic parts for automotive and other industries, and textiles.

IndianOil has plans to raise the combined capacity of its 11 group refineries from 80.7 MMTPA currently to over 100 MMTPA in the next five years through brownfield expansions. The Corporation is also pursuing a 60-MMTPA integrated refinery-cum-petrochemicals project on the west coast jointly with other Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs, BPCL and HPCL). IndianOil is also working to convert its refineries to produce superior BS-VI quality fuel by April 2020.

Equity in LNG Terminal
The IndianOil Board has also given its in-principle approval for acquiring up to 50% equity in GSPL LNG Ltd., which is setting up a 5-MMTPA LNG Terminal at Mundra Port in Gujarat. GSPL LNG Ltd. is a joint venture of Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation (GSPC, a Govt. of Gujarat undertaking) and Adani Enterprises Ltd. (AEL).

The LNG Terminal, to be commissioned in the fourth quarter of 2017-18, will have receipt, storage and re-gassification facilities for LNG and will be connected to Gujarat State Petronet Ltd. (GSPL) existing pipelines network at Anjaar (Gujarat). The estimated cost of the Mundra LNG Terminal is approx. Rs. 5,040 crore. 

As the second largest player in natural gas in the country, IndianOil is making significant investments in natural gas infrastructures and marketing in line with the country’s changing energy mix.

“We already have investments across the gas value chain, from LNG import terminals to city gas distribution networks, the major among them being a 5-MMTPA LNG import terminal at Kamarajar port near Chennai, scheduled for commissioning in 2018-19,” Mr. Sanjiv Singh said.