India’s IOC to invest in processing-related upgrades, expansions

Indian Oil Corp. Ltd. (IOC) has approved a series of expansions and upgrades designed to improve fuel quality and production at several of its refining and petrochemical operations in India.

The company’s board at its Feb. 13 meeting approved a total investment of 78.18 billion rupees ($1.259 billion) for the projects, IOC said in a filing to India’s BSE Ltd. (formerly Bombay Stock Exchange).

At its 13.7 million-tonne/year Koyali refinery in Gujarat, the company will invest 18.43 billion rupees ($297 million) to implement a project that would equip the plant to produce gasoline and diesel that conforms to Euro 4 quality standards in order to increase national supplies ahead of the Indian government’s Euro 4 fuel quality compliance deadline of Apr. 1, 2017, IOC said.

The company will invest 13.27 billion rupees ($213.8 million) for a similar fuel quality upgrading project to be implemented at its 6 million-tpy Barauni refinery in Bihar.

To help meet naphtha feedstock requirements at its 2.3 million-tpy naphtha cracker complex at Panipat in Haryana, the company will invest 8.9 billion rupees ($143 million) both for the construction of a dedicated naphtha pipeline from Jaipur, Rajasthan, to Panipat, as well as for augmentation of IOC’s 1,056-km Koyali-Sanganer products pipeline, according to the filing.

At Paradip, on India's northeastern coast, the company will invest 37.52 billion rupees ($604.5 million) on an ethylene glycol project, along with associated installations, IOC said.

Designed to help IOC consolidate its glycol business, the project would result in the production of low-cost monoethylene glycol using off gas from fluid catalytic cracking operations at the company’s Paradip refinery, which is scheduled to reach its full-processing capacity of 15 million tpy later this year (OGJ Online, Dec. 1, 2014).

Detailed timelines for the newly announced projects were not disclosed.