Indian Oil Corporation Chairman, Shrikant Madhav Vaidya, said in the company’s annual meeting of shareholders that IOC will invest close to Rs 1 lakh crore to raise its refining capacity. With this the refining capacity would increase by almost a third in the coming 4-5 years. This decision has been taken looking at the surge in the fuel demand which would be growing in the future.
In the meeting IOC Chairman highlighted that petrol demand has already increased at pre-COVID levels and demand for diesel which is the most used fuel in the country is expected to return to normal levels by Diwali. There are forecasts that the Indian fuel demand would be climbing up to 400-450 million tonnes by the year 2040. At present the demand is of 250 million tonnes. To keep pace with the growing demand IOC plans to aggressively roll out new projects. This initiative is slated to expand refining capacity to over 25 million metric tonnes per annum. This includes (subsidiary) CPCL, and investment commitment of close to Rs 1 lakh crore over the next 4 to 5 years, mentioned IOC Chairman.
The capacity of IOC Koyali refinery in Gujarat would be raised to 18 million tonnes from the current 13.7 million tonnes. Panipat refinery in Haryana is planned to go up to 25 million tonnes from the current 15 million tonnes. There are expansion plans of Barauni and Guwahati refineries as well. Also, a new plant is being built at the subsidiary, Chennai Petroleum Corp Ltd (CPCL).
