The Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals Limited (MRPL) received the first shipment of crude oil from the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation’s (ONGC) KG-DWN 98/2 Block on Saturday.
ONGC commenced production from the deep-water KG-DWN 98/2 Block in the Krishna Godavari (KG) basin off the Bay of Bengal on the Kakinada coast in January, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi flagged off Swarna Sindhu, the vessel carrying crude oil to MRPL on March 2.
This sweet (low sulphur) indigenous crude is poised to be transformed into various fuels and petrochemicals at MRPL , contributing impactfully to the Athmanirbhar Bharath mission . MRPL received 60,000 metric tonnes of crude oil for processing at its refinery at New Mangaluru Port on Saturday.
MRPL director (refinery) Sanjay Varma told reporters that the crude oil will be processed shortly. “MRPL has software which selects the crude on an economy basis and as per other factors, and we have the technical capability of processing highly viscous crude to light crude, and high sulphur to low sulphur crude,” he said. “We have 250 varieties of crude in our basket, and this refinery has the achievement of processing 100 types of crude. The
refinery receives crude oil from various parts of the world, including the Middle East and from Mumbai High field, Mangala field in Rajasthan and others,” he added.
The current production in KG-DWN 98/2 Block is 12,000 barrels per day, using a floating production and storage offloading (FPSO), and once it reaches its peak production which is 45-50,000 barrels per day production, it is going to have 7% incremental oil and gas production at a national level. Approximately 80-85% of the crude oil is imported, reflecting the emphasis placed by the government of India on augmenting domestic production and curbing reliance on crude imports.
Varma said that several factors such as shipping cost, insurance, distress crude or issues such as an attack in the Red Sea, have a bearing on the landing cost of crude. MRPL MD Mundkur Shyamprasad Kamath said that the team will evaluate the value and characteristics of crude oil, once processing begins. Typically, domestic crude oils exhibit low sulfur content and medium viscosity.