The Hindu Business Line : Essar's Vadinar terminal to be commissioned by month-end

After facing initial delays, Essar's 32-million-tonne oil terminal at Vadinar in Gujarat is now expected to go on stream by the end of this month. This will fall in line with the commissioning of its refinery project scheduled for April next year.

The terminal facility in the port include single buoy mooring system with annual capacity of 25 million tonnes, crude oil tankage facility with interconnecting pipelines with a capacity of 20 million tonnes, product tankage facility of 14 million tonnes and marine product despatch facility with jetty with a capacity of 12 million tonnes.

It will also have a rail car loading facility for products with a capacity of seven million tonnes and truck loading facility for products with a capacity of 2.5 million tonnes.

After its recent restructuring, the Vadinar oil terminal became a subsidiary of Essar Shipping and Logistics Ltd, which also owns 77 per cent of Essar Shipping.

The company is planning an early start-up of the refinery project by scaling up the pace of work and save substantial time on the implementation schedule. "We expect the first consignment of crude to arrive in the third week of September to enable pre-commissioning activities to commence in October. A substantial portion of the infrastructure and utilities has been completed," a company official said.

Vadinar is an all-weather deep-draft natural port. More than 60 per cent of India's crude imports land in and around this region.

The refinery's location is expected to give the company access to the growing markets in the north and western region of India through product pipelines.

The eastern and southern parts of India will be serviced through the coastal route circling the country.

The refinery, which will have a capacity of 10.5 million tonnes a year, is being set up at an investment of $2.2 billion.

It is designed to handle a diverse range of crude mixes and configured to produce Euro II and Euro III grades of petrol and diesel.

With mid-stream upgradation of processes and technologies, the refinery will have the capability to process the most sour, acidic and heavy crude.

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