Reliance Plans To Boost Capacity Of World’s Biggest Oil Refinery

India’s Reliance Industries—which operates the world’s biggest refining complex—is planning a major capacity expansion of the site to increase crude oil processing capacity to around 2 million bpd, from the current 1.2-million-bpd capacity, Reuters reported on Wednesday, citing two sources.

According to the sources, who had seen a company presentation on the plans to the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, Reliance Industries is considering expanding the capacity of its dual refinery complex in Jamnagar by 30 million tons by 2030, to 100 million tons per year, which would be equal to some 2 million bpd.

Reliance’s Jamnagar refinery has crude processing capacity of 1.24 million barrels per stream day (BPSD), and is future ready and can produce gasoline and diesel of any grade, according to the company’s website.

According to one of Reuters’ sources, the plan would be to have gasoline and diesel production capacity close to 60 million tons by 2030, for which cheaper heavy crude grades would be used.

Reliance has not yet presented details of the plans or costs, but the expansion would likely need some US$10 billion in investment, the sources say.

The plan to expand the world’s biggest oil refining complex is a sign that Reliance Industries continues to be bullish on India’s expected fuel and oil demand growth, although there have been signals of policy changes in China and India—the two biggest oil demand growth drivers—that are rolling out plans to dramatically accelerate the adoption of electric vehicles (EVs) by 2030. 

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Nevertheless, demand for gasoline and diesel for existing internal combustion-engine vehicles is expected to stay strong as the Indian population grows and more people are able to afford cars.

According to this year’s BP Energy Outlook, India’s consumption of energy in transport will grow by 5.8 percent a year by 2035, and oil will remain the dominant fuel source with a 93-percent market share in 2035.

By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com

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