GAIL India intends to invest Rs 1,000 crore for setting up an additional gas cracker unit at its gas-based petrochemical complex located at Oraiya in Uttar Pradesh.
At present, the plant has a capacity of producing 3,00,000 tonne per annum (tpa) of ethylene and 2,60,000 tpa of polymers.
The new gas cracker unit will increase the capacity of the plant to 5,50,000 tpa of ethylene. The capacity to produce polymers will rise to 3,30,000 polymers per annum.
As part of the expansion process, the company also intends to increase the capacity of the high density polyethylene (HDPE) unit as well as the HDPE/LLDPE (linear low density polyethylene) Swing unit plant.
The plant has a capacity of 1,00,000 tpa of HDPE and 1,60,000 tonne HDPE/LLDPE.
"As a first step in the expansion process, work has already started on the de-bottlenecking project to increase the capacity of LLDPE\HDPE Swing plant from 1,60,000 tpa to 2,10,000 tpa," a GAIL official said.
The polymer sales of GAIL during 2001-02 were 2,50,000 tonne against 1,83,311 tonne in 2000-01. Last year, the petrochemicals plant achieved a 96 per cent capacity utilisation against the polyethylene industry average of 87 per cent. The plant also has a 100 per cent assured feedback from its own supply of natural gas.
"We have established marketing offices for the petrochemical products in all major consumption centres and has also developed a widespread distribution network throughout the country," the official said.
The company has also set up a product applications research centre to provide engineering and technological support to its customers.
"Being the only plant outside the western part of the country, it offers easy access to polymer consumers in northern India and parts of central India," said the official.
