Indian Oil Corp (IOC)-run Gujarat Refinery's Rs 6,000-crore fuel quality improvement and and residue upgradation project near here is scheduled for commissioning by December, a top official has said.
Upon completion, the facility, located on the city's outskirts, will commence supply of Euro III and IV grade fuel to market by April 1, 2010, Gujarat Refinery Executive Director A S Basu told PTI here.
Basu was speaking on the sidelines of a function organised here yesterday to mark Indian Oil's golden jubilee celebrations.
The project will help in refining crude from the north Gujarat which contains high acid. The poor quality of crude from north Gujarat requires more high-tech refining to make petroleum products out of it, he said.
The facility will also be in a position to refine crude from Rajasthan for which Indian Oil and Cairn Energy have floated a joint venture, Basu said.
An ambitious plan for Indian refineries, with an outlay of Rs 55,000 crore, for capacity augmentation, de-bottlenecking and quality upgradation, has been chalked out, he said.
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Currently, Gujarat Refinery has capacity to refine 14 million metric tonnes of crude per annum and plans are afoot to expand this capacity, Basu said.
With the commissioning of linear alkyl benzene unit of Gujarat Refinery in 2004, Indian Oil made a foray in petrochemicals, Basu stated.
"We are now working towards developing Gujarat Refinery as a petrochemical hub of Indian Oil. Value-added projects like paraoxylene plant have been planned."
At present, IOC Group's refining capacity is 60.2 million metric tonnes per annum (mmtpa), or 1.2 million barrels per day, which accounts for 33.8 per cent of national refining capacity, he said.
"We plan to expand the Group's refining capacity to 80 mmtpa by year 2011-12."
IOC's 9,273-km long cross-country pipelines network has been serving as the backbone of its refining and marketing operations, Basu said.
"We plan to add about 4,000 km of new pipelines by the end of XI Five-Year Plan (2007-12)."
The IOC's golden jubilee celebrations began at Gujarat Refinery here by unveiling of a statue of Mahatma Gandhi in the presence of top company officials, District Collector Vijay Nehra and Mayor Balkrrishna Shukla.