MRPL Director (refinery) Sanjay Varma speaks to mediapersons at MRPL on Saturday. MRPL MD Mundkur Shyamprasad Kamath and Group GM Krishna Hegde look on.
Credit: DH Photo/Fakruddin H
Mangaluru: Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Limited (MRPL) received the first consignment of 'KG 98/2' crude oil from Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC). The ship carrying the crude called Swarna Sindhu had been flagged off by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on March 2.
The MRPL has received 60,000 metric tonne crude oil for processing in the refinery, MRPL Director (refinery) Sanjay Varma told mediapersons here.
The crude oil received will be processed shortly at the MRPL, after knowing its characteristics. Varma said that the MRPL has technical capability and use of software to process all kinds of crude oil, including those with high sulphur content.
“We have 250 varieties of crude oil in our basket and have processed more than 100 varieties of crude oil in the refinery. Our technical capability can process any crude oil from various places, including Middle East and Latin American countries and also from Mumbai High field, Mangala field in Rajasthan and others in India," he stated.
This is the first cargo of crude from Krishna Godavari basin where the exploration was carried out by the ONGC in the east coast. The KG field is producing 12,000 barrels of crude oil per day currently, using a floating production and storage offloading (FPSO). The crude is stored on the FPSO, and once it reaches a critical level, is transferred to the ship, which carries the crude oil to the refinery. This crude oil will increase countries' production by 7 per cent, Varma explained.
About 80 per cent of the country’s crude oil is imported. Under 'Atma Nirbhar Bharat' mandate, the country is emphasising the need to increase the domestic production of crude oil.
He said, “the crude oil will be high in sulphur and heavy metals and at the refinery we remove all impurities from the crude oil and give quality petroleum products which are not harmful."
MRPL MD Mundkur Shyamprasad Kamath said, “we assess the value of the crude oil and its characteristics once the processing commences. Most of the domestic crude oil has low sulphur content with medium viscosity.”