: The Mangalore Refinery and
Petrochemicals Limited (MRPL) is playing an active role in filling the Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserve Limited (ISPRL) underground crude oil caverns at its Mangaluru and Padur facilities.
The Union Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas has mandated ISPRL to work closely with public sector oil companies, including MRPL, to achieve the target of filling up Mangaluru and Padur caverns, a press release said here.
The target can be achieved by taking advantage of the prevailing very low crude oil prices in the international market, the release said.
The series of crude oil cargoes of varying volumes from one million barrels to two million barrels, being sourced by MRPL, IOCL and BPCL, would be unloaded in the Single Point Mooring (SPM) of MRPL falling under the jurisdiction of NMPT during April and May, before the onset of the monsoon in the region.
The ministry had already informed through a tweet that it is going an extra mile to meet the country's energy security in spite of the COVID-19 challenge.
Crude oil cargoes at low prices are lined up to reach Mangalore port during April and early May to completely fill the strategic petroleum reserves (SPRs) at Mangaluru and Padur, the release said.
MRPL managing director M Venkatesh confirmed that the first consignment of two million barrels by MRPL and the second consignment of one million barrels by IOCL have already been successfully unloaded into the caverns.
Taking advantage of the low crude oil prices, ISPRL has started filling the country's strategic petroleum reserves to enhance the energy security of the nation.
MRPL, IOCL, BPCL and HPCL are associated in this exercise to fill the three SPRs located at Visakapatnam, Mangaluru and Padur.
MRPLs role is crucial in filling the 1.5-million metric tonne facility in Mangalore and 2.5-million metric tonne facility at Padur as it extends its SPM and booster station facilities for this activity.
The SPM facility, located 17 km from the shore and within its jurisdiction in the Arabian sea, would be utilised to pump crude oil from ships of different size including VLCC (very large crude carriers) vessels, the release said.
Crude discharged from the ship through SPM and subsea pipeline reaches the MRPL booster station located at the landfall point.
From the booster station, the crude is routed through the crude oil pipeline to Mangaluru ISPRL cavern located within Mangalore Special Economic Zone or through the booster pump to caverns located in Padur in Udupi district, 30 km from here.
MRPL, Karnatakas sole hydrocarbon refinery, is a central public sector organisation under the Union ministry of petroleum and natural gas and a subsidiary of Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC).
The refinery constitutes 7 per cent of the nation's crude oil refining capacity and meets the demands of Karnataka and neighbouring regions of bordering states.
It is sustaining the refinery operations at 50 per cent capacity to meet the critical demand of LPG and ensuring availability of petrol and diesel to all oil marketing companies in this hour of crisis, the release said.
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