Indian Oil Kickstarts the ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat’ Mission With Huge Refinery Expansion Strategies, New MEG Facility Almost 50% Complete

The last week of August ended with optimism for the Indian labor as state owned Indian Oil Corp (IOC) announced expansion of its Barauni refinery in Bihar as part of over 2,800 projects being held under the Aatmanirbhar Bharat campaign to push the domestic manufacturing and create employment opportunities in the country. IOC is expanding the capacity of its Barauni refinery from 6 million tonnes per annum to 9 million tonnes per annum at an estimated investment of INR 14,800 crore. Indian oil is currently investing around 2 lakh crores in 2,814 projects out of which 622 correspond to its refinery division. The company’s projects which are aimed to generate a total of 217.7 lakh man-days of work in FY21, include expansion or upgradation of Paradip-Haldia-Barauni crude oil pipeline at a cost of around INR 3,696 crore. Till August 15, the company has paid nearly INR 818.35 crore to the workers engaged in various ongoing projects, generating about 54.6 lakh man-days of employment. Among its various scheduled projects are expansion of LPG import facility in Paradip, a crude oil terminal at Atchutapuram, Andhra Pradesh, expansion of chemical units in Panipat refinery and a 2G Ethanol plant in Panipat. The company’s almost half of the Rs 5,654 crore Mono Ethylene Glycol (MEG) project at Paradip refinery is already completed. The new 357 KTPA MEG facility is the key driver for the growing textiles industry in the region and will cater to the rising demand for polyester fiber. Prices of Indian Monoethylene Glycol gained momentum by close to 3% in the last two weeks of August with Ex-Depot Chennai prices nearing to INR 34500 per MT, which further squeezed the polyester margins.