Indian refiners processed 21.6 million tonnes of crude oil in April, registering only a marginal 1% increase from the corresponding period of last fiscal, data from the Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell showed. The processed volumes, however, came on a par with the government’s target of 21.2 million tonnes.
Of the total volumes, government-owned oil public sector undertakings and joint ventures processed 14.5 million tonnes last month, while private refiners processed 7.1 million tonnes of the total crude oil. The country’s downstream companies processed 2.2 million tonnes of indigenous crude oil of the 2.4 million tonnes of crude oil produced last month. Total imported crude oil processed came to be at 19.4 million tonnes by all the Indian refineries.
The International Energy Agency expects Indian refining capacity to expand by 1 million barrels a day from the currently assessed 5.8 million barrels a day by 2030. The agency sees the majority of growth to be driven by the public sector undertakings as they prepare for continued rising domestic demand and an increased share of petrochemical production.
State-owned oil marketing companies are already planning to increase their respective refining capacities to meet the growing demand. Indian Oil (IOCL), operating and holding approximately 28% of total refinery capacity as of 2023, is planning to expand and enhance its existing capacity by 327,000 barrels per day by 2030. Bharat Petroleum (BPCL) also sees all three of its refineries to add capacity, totalling 134,000 barrels per day, as per IEA.
The country has expanded its refining capacity over the years to 5.8 mbd in 2023 from 3.1 mbd in 2006, becoming the fourth largest refiner globally, according to data by IEA.
Now, India intends to increase its refining capacity further to 450 million tonnes per annum from present capacity of 254 MMTPA by 2030.
India is the third-largest consumer of crude oil and imports almost 88% of its oil requirement. In 2023, the country was the world’s second-largest crude oil net importer as it imported 4.6 mbd of oil to meet rising demand and refinery intake, IEA said. In April, India imported 4.86 million barrels per day of crude oil, data from Kpler showed.
According to the agency, increasing refining processing is likely to lift crude imports further to 5.8 million barrels per day with major implications for India’s security of supply.
“The flip side to increased crude processing is that India will become more reliant on crude imports and hence increased attention is needed on its security of supply and how the government and industry can best prepare for any possible disruptions,” it said in its Indian oil market outlook.
