JNS: Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) on Saturday said it is all set to supply low emission BS-6 from April 1 and that there may be a marginal or slight increase in retail prices.
The largest oil supplier of the Country has spent over Rs 17,000 crore to upgrade its refineries to produce the low-Sulphur diesel and petrol, informed the Company’s Executive Director Bihar State Office (BSO) Vibhash Kumar while interacting with media persons at Ranchi.
Without disclosing the quantum of price increase, Kumar said, “There is chances that the retail prices of fuels may register marginal increase from April 1 when the whole country will be run on new fuels, which will have Sulphur content of only 10 parts per million (ppm) as against the 50 ppm earlier.”
However, Kumar, asserted that the price hike will not be a burden on consumers. “We are not looking at this investment from a pure return on investment basis, but this is a national mandate and we have done it,” he added.
Kumar said that the State-run oil marketing companies (OMCs) have also invested over thousands of crore rupees to upgrade their refineries.
Addressing the gathering of media persons Kumar said that the Company has been supplying BS-6 from February 26-27 and that it would sell only the new fuels from March 1. IOC switched to BS-VI fuel production a fortnight ago and all its depots and containers are ready now, he added.
“Some remote locations, where the sell is very low, will take some more time to supply the fuel, said Kumar. “But the company is planning to drain out the entire BS-IV stock and replenish the new fuels at such locations,” he added.
Speaking on the occasion the Executive Director said that, all those countries that moved to low emission fuels are charging higher prices; and from April 1, the prices will also be benchmarked against Euro VI prices as against the present practice of cost-plus model.
The Ministry of Petroleum, Government of India has decided that it will supply BS-6 fuels across the country from 1 April of this year to comply with the resolution of the Perish Summit to decrease CO2 emission. The Ministry decided to switch to BS-6 from BS-4 skipping BS-5 entirely in a little over three years as BS-4 was introduced in 1917.
Speaking on the occasion IOC BSO Chief Manager Corporate Communication, Vina Kumari said that there is two storage terminal in Jharkhand one at Jassidih and another at Khunti. “The Company also installed two bottling plants in the State, one at Bokaro and another at Jamshedpur,” she added.
