New refinery to boost Punjab industries

The inauguration of the refinery is likely to play a pivotal role in attracting plastic and other industries in the state. The project is the largest investment in Punjab since independence.

According to HMEL officials, with the commissioning of the refinery, Punjab may see creation of polypropylene-based downstream industry and can attract an investment of ~5,000 crore.

The state government has already identified 200 acres of land in the vicinity of the refinery to attract tertiary industry that could use the refinery’s by-products as their raw material.

In an interaction with Business Standard, HMEL officials said that beside producing LPG, naphtha, petrol, diesel, aviation fuel, pet coke, etc, the refinery will also produce polypropylene, which is a source of raw material for the plastic industries.

 

According to him, the state of the art only refinery in Punjab will be one of the few refineries in the country, which will have the capacity to produce 4.40 lakh Metric tonnes of polypropylene.

Further stating that the cities like Bathinda, Ludhiana,, Banur and Lalru being seen as most attractive locations for the setting up of polypropylene based industry, about 50-60 per cent of the total produce is expected to be consumed in Northern states only. He mentioned that the state government decision to set up Industrial Park in the vicinity of the refinery is very forward looking step in this direction.

It is worth mentioning that Polypropylene granules are mainly used by plastic industry such as woven sack and film units as main raw material in manufacturing of plastic items like buckets, mugs, toys, plastic furniture, casing of electrical equipment, wrapping films etc

The refinery having processing capacity of nine million tonnes of crude a year (180,000 barrels per day) is a joint venture between Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL) and Mittal Energy - a subsidiary of steel tycoon Lakshmi Mittal's company. It is producing high value petroleum products such as LPG, naphtha, petrol, diesel, aviation fuel, pet coke etc. The liquid products would be marketed through HPCL, the solid products like sulphur, pet-coke and polypropylene would be sold directly by HMEL.