New Delhi: State-owned Indian Oil Corp (IOC) will invest about Rs 8,000 crore to expand capacity at its Koyali oil refinery in Gujarat to 18 million tonnes per annum by 2016-17.
The expansion from 13.7 million tonnes will “lead to improvement in distillate yield thereby enabling production of more value added products from the refinery,” a company statement quoted Gujarat Refinery Executive Director Gautam Roy as saying.
Also, the increase in the high sulphur crude processing capability will lead to improvement in refinery margins and profitability, he said.
IOC commissioned a 3 million tonne a year refinery at Koyali in Gujarat in 1965. Over the years, the capacity of the refinery, which later came to be known as Gujarat refinery, has gradually been increased to 13.7 million tons per annum.
To augment the operational reliability, the refinery is setting up a new gas turbine that will provide ensured power to the unit.
The expansion will help the unit raise its processing of high sulphur crude, which are cheaper. High sulphur crude oil made up for 51.5 per cent of the crude the refiner processed in 2012-13 and in first quarter (Q1) of current fiscal this has already gone up to 54.4 per cent.
The statement said Gujarat refinery has engaged DuPont - the global leader in employee safety, to sensitise employees about safe operation and bring about a cultural change in their behaviour towards safety.
“The Rs 20 crore IndianOil-DuPont Safety Partnership for safety improvement is being implemented in IOC for the first time in Gujarat Refinery,” it said.
Gujarat refinery is IOC's second biggest refinery behind Panipat unit which has a capacity of 15 million tonnes. The company owns 9 refineries with a total capacity of 54.2 million tonnes per annum. It also owns Chennai Petroleum Corp Ltd (CPCL) which has a 11.50 million tonne unit near Chennai.
Besides Koyali, IOC is also looking at expanding its Haldia refinery capacity to 8 million tonnes from 7.5 million tonnes currently while also raising Chennai refinery capacity by 0.6 million tonnes.
It is also building a 15 million tonne new refinery at Paradip in Orissa by 2015-16.
