GAIL to focus on petrochem, natural gas network to meet Rs 50K-cr target

GAIL India, which owns and operates a network of over 7,000 km of natural gas high pressure trunk pipeline in India, has outlined natural gas (transmission), petrochemicals and city gas distribution (CGD) as focus areas of future growth.

With the existing projects and new business initiatives being taken, GAIL India is moving steadily on its way to achieve the revenue target of Rs 50,000 crore plus by 2011-12.

GAIL India chairman and managing director UD Choubey told FE that during the 11th Plan period the company would build 5,000 km of pipelines. These would include large trunk pipelines along with smaller pipelines which would provide connectivity among trunk lines so that the company is able to have a cross country grid.

GAIL has a transmission capacity of around 148 million cubic meters per day (mmscmd). This will help take the natural gas to northern, eastern and southern parts of the country which so far have been deprived of this environment friendly fuel due to lack of availability.

Choubey informed that the company expects over 200 cities to fall in the catchment area of these pipelines and they have a potential to have city gas distribution networks for transport and piped natural gas.

?GAIL is a pioneer in City Gas Distribution projects and we believe that the next decade will belong to city gas in India. GAIL has set up a wholly owned subsidiary GAIL Gas Limited to pursue city gas distribution and CNG corridor projects. This pro-active step was taken to harness opportunity in the evolving market.?

GAIL has identified 230 cities for setting up city gas projects in the country, Choubey said.

On the petrochemicals front, GAIL India is expanding the capacity of its petrochemical plant at Pata in phases, initially to 5 lakh tonne per annum (TPA) and subsequently to 8 lakh TPA.

GAIL India is also setting up a 280,000 TPA Petrochemical Complex at Lepetkata, Dibrugarh, Assam at an investment of Rs. 5,460 crore, through a Joint Venture Brahmaputra Cracker and Polymer Limited. The complex has a capacity of 220,000 TPA of Ethylene and 60,000 tons per annum of propylene. The project completion is 60 months from the zero date of September 2007. According to Choubey, GAIL India is also looking at various opportunities for setting up at least one more petrochemical plant in India and one abroad.