Numaligarh Refinery to lay pipeline to export petroleum to Bangladesh

Assam-based Numaligarh Refinery Limited (NRL), a subsidiary of Bharat Petroleum, is eying the Bangladesh market in a big way for exporting petro products. The company targets to export around 1 million metric tonnes of petroleum products to the neighbouring country in next two to three years.

The company today signed an MoU (memorandum of understanding) with Bangladesh Petroleum Corporation (BPC) in Dhaka, to lay 130 km long pipeline from NRL's marketing terminal in Siliguri, in West Bengal, to BPC's depot in Parbatipur.

The pipeline project would be implemented through a joint venture (JV) company and NRL sources informed that the JV company would be formed within three months. "We have done preliminary route survey and as per preliminary estimates, the project would cost around 350 crore," said a company spokesperson.

NRL had earlier in 2007 exported petroleum to Bangladesh through the river route but had to soon stop as the river route option was found to be economically unviable, besides the government raising security concerns. Since then, the company had been putting in efforts to lay a pipeline to export petroleum to Bangladesh. "Today's MoU is a culmination of years of efforts by NRL to find an efficient and safe mode for export. It is a win-win situation for both the countries," said the spokesperson. NRL expects to commission the pipeline within three years.

Besides eyeing Bangladesh, NRL is also set to export to Nepal from its Siliguri terminal "soon". The company had last year signed an agreement with Nepal based Birat Petroleum Private Limited (BPPL) for exporting diesel and petrol. NRL is waiting for "necessary government clearances" which it is hopeful will get "soon". "We have worked out all the modalities and ready to export. We are just waiting for the necessary clearances from the government, and once we get them we will soon start exporting to Nepal," said a company sources.