Indian Oil ready to splurge

New Delhi, July 4 (PTI): Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) will invest Rs 40,000 crore to expand its refining capacity to over 100 million tonnes (mt) by 2022 as the nation's largest oil company looks to add capacity to meet the country's rising energy needs.

"As we see, (fuel) demand is expected to grow at 3.5-4 per cent CAGR and we need to build capacities to meet that requirement," IOC director (refineries) Sanjiv Singh said.

International Energy Agency's World Energy Outlook projects a 4 per cent CAGR (compounded annual growth rate) growth in India's fuel demand to 348mt by 2030, from 184mt in 2015-16. BP projects demand to be 335 mt, while the Energy Information Administration of the US has estimated it at 294mt, which translates into a CAGR of 3 per cent.

India has a refining capacity of 232.06mt.

"All the projections clearly show that the demand will grow and unless we start investing now, we will lag," he said.

IOC will expand its refining capacity to 104.55mt by 2022 from 80.7mt per annum with an investment of about Rs 40,000 crore, he said.

It is looking to scale up its Koyali refinery in Gujarat to 18mt from 13.7mt, while the capacity of the Panipat refinery in Haryana will be raised a quarter to 20.2mt from 15mt.

A 3-mtpa capacity addition each is planned for Uttar Pradesh's Mathura and Bihar's Barauni refineries, which will take their capacities to 11mt and 9mt, respectively.

Indian Oil Corporation