The Hindu Business Line : IndianOil Petronas plans to handle LPG at Ennore port

INDIANOIL Petronas plans to handle LPG at Ennore port's multi-user marine liquid terminal, to be operated by the IMC-Larsen & Toubro consortium. It will bring LPG from Malaysia and distribute it in south India. It plans to handle annually 0.6 million tonnes of LPG at the terminal, according to a source.

The company is a joint venture promoted by IOC and Petroliam Nasional Berhad (Petronas), a Malaysian Government company.

It was incorporated in December 1998 with 50:50 equity contributions from both promoter companies to supply LPG in India, according to information available on the company Web site.

According to the source, the LPG handling would take off after receiving environment clearance.

The consumption of LPG products in India is currently 9.5 million tonnes and is expected to rise to 15 million tonnes by 2010, according to the Web site.

IMC is a leading bulk liquid storage terminal service provider with terminals at almost all the major ports in the country.

The company's Rs 200-crore proposal at Ennore Port, which is India's first corporatised port located in the northern outskirts of Chennai, is to construct the terminal on a 30-year build-operate-transfer basis where the terminal operator would share a percentage of the gross revenues with the port.

The IMC-L&T consortium, which quoted a higher revenue sharing of 21.678 per cent, was issued the letter of intent on October 12, 2004.

The jetty and storage facilities at the port would be for all kinds of liquid bulk cargo - petroleum products, liquefied gases, chemicals, and vegetable oils.

The jetty will have a capacity to annually handle three million tonnes of liquids and a wide range of tanker vessels up to 100,000 DWT (dead weight tonne).

Jetty and tank terminal facilities are expected to be ready for operations from the second quarter of 2007, according to the IMC Web site.

For the Ennore Port, the marine liquid cargo terminal will be the first step to transform itself into a multi-cargo port.

The port has identified the contractor to construct the iron ore berth and another coal berth.

Currently, it has berths to handle coal for the Tamil Nadu Electricity Board.