The project had already been approved by the Public Investment Board (PIB). The pending CCEA approval comes soon after GAIL acquired the autonomy it is entitled to as a navratna, by inducting four non-executive directors on its board. As a navratna, GAIL can invest five per cent of its net worth in any project without the prior approval of its prinicipal shareholder, the Union government.

The Gandhar complex will source natural gas from the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation's (ONGC) gas and oilfield at Gandhar, to be able to process five million standard cubic metres per day (MMSCMD) of non-associated and associated gas, including 2.07 lakh tonne of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG).

The LPG produced will be adequate to fill 14 million domestic LPG cylinders. The gas complexwill comprise a gas compression unit, LPG unit, special boiling point solvent (SBP) and pentane unit, utilities and offsites, product storage and despatch facilities. It will be able to produce five MMSCMD of rich gas, 17,406 tonne per annum of pentane, 25,543 tonne per annum of SBP and 4,670 MMSCMD of lean gas.

The GAIL complex will have the 10th plant capable of recovering LPG from natural gas. The other nine such LPG plants are operated by the ONGC and Oil India Limited (OIL), apart from GAIL.

The project is expected to result in a recurring saving of Rs 120 crore worth of foreign exchange per year, from LPG imports. At present 1.087 million tonne of LPG has to be imported every year to cater for domestic demand, despite a domestic production of 3.4 million tonne.

Salal project gets Cabinet approval of Rs 61.47 crore The CCEA also approved a proposal of renovating and modernisation of the Salal hydro-power project stage-I with an investment of Rs 61.47 crore. The project, with an installed capacityof 345 mw, is located in Dhampur district of Jammu and Kashmir. The debt and equity ratio of the project will be 1:1, information and broadcasting minister Pramod Mahajan told newsmen after the CCEA meeting.