Guwahati Refinery

Guwahati, Dec. 21: Guwahati Refinery — India’s first public sector oil refinery — is embarking on a Rs 250-crore modernisation drive as part of its golden jubilee celebration for product diversification and to improve its margins.

This also includes laying down an underground LPG pipeline from Guwahati Refinery to Sarpara and North Guwahati bottling plants to avoid loading of LPG in trucks from the refinery, which is not conducive to traffic movement in the city.

“It is still in the feasibility stage and the 15km pipeline will be an underground one under the Brahmaputra,” Guwahati Refinery general manager B.P. Das said at a news conference here today.

Das said an estimated 140 tonnes of LPG is moved from Guwahati Refinery to Sarpara and North Guwahati bottling plants by road.

Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru dedicated Indian Oil’s first refinery, Guwahati Refinery, to the nation as a New Year’s gift on January 1, 1962.

The commissioning of the refinery being the first one in the public sector marked the course of history of indigenous oil refining in the country.

The refinery, dubbed Gangotri of Indian Oil, will also lay a pipeline to transport aviation turbine fuel to Guwahati airport.

“We are awaiting wildlife clearances as it will pass through Rani reserve forest,” Das said.

Once it gets the approvals, the 35km pipeline will take 18 months for commissioning.

It will also be producing Euro-IV for which it has developed a technology for sulphur reduction in Assam’s crude.

The Indane maximisation technology designed to achieve LPG yield is being revamped to augment LPG production. The initial crude processing capacity of the refinery at the time of commissioning was 0.75 million metric tonnes per annum which will now be touching 1.05 in 2011-12.

“The biggest challenge in the Northeast is crude availability,” Das said.

The refinery produces various products and supplies them to different parts of the Northeast as well as beyond, till Siliguri through the Guwahati-Siliguri Pipeline, spanning 435km, which was the first pipeline of Indian Oil and was commissioned in 1964.

Most of the products of Guwahati Refinery are evacuated through pipeline and some through road.

The golden jubilee celebrations of Guwahati Refinery will be a monthlong celebration, which will include several activities and programmes for employees and their family members, retired employees, the pioneers, stakeholders and the community.