NRL's capacity expansion cost escalates by Rs 5,432 crore

Numaligarh Refinery Ltd (NRL) on Wednesday said the cost of its capacity expansion project has escalated by Rs 5,432 crore to Rs 28,026 crore due to adoption of advanced technology.

In an official release, the largest PSU refiner in the northeast said the Union Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas has already approved the revised project cost for increasing capacity from 3 million metric tonnes per annum to 9 MMTPA.

"With adoption of state-of-the-art technology in this configuration and addition of extremely complex schemes like residue hydrocracking, the refinery will be able to process heavier crude oil and maximize production of distillates.

"This adoption of technology led to an increase in the project cost from Rs 22,594 crore to Rs 28,026 crore," it added.

The initial planned configuration of the upcoming 6-MMTPA unit has been improved to make it petrochemical ready, focusing on upgradation of refinery residue by using new technology, NRL said.

"In the intervening period between the original planning of the refinery configuration for expansion and the present market scenario, NRL has tapped the opportunity of Residue Upgradation Technology and availability of natural gas to revise this configuration.

"The configuration and unit design is targeted to achieve best in class energy efficiency on global benchmarking. With increased distillate yield, the refiner will also be able to increase its LPG production, thereby eliminating LPG deficit in the northeastern region," the release said.

The company had started the expansion project in 2019 by announcing the single-largest investment in the northeast and aimed at completing the works in four years by around 2023.

The Numaligarh Refinery Expansion Project also includes a 1,398-km crude oil pipeline of 9 MMTPA from Odisha's Paradip to Numaligarh and a 654-km product pipeline of 6 MMTPA from Numaligarh to West Bengal's Siliguri.

In NRL, Oil India owns a 72.15 per cent stake, while the Assam government and Engineers India have 23.48 per cent and 4.37 per cent holding respectively.