- Indian refiners' crude throughput in July bounced to its highest in three months, as the easing of coronavirus restrictions boosted economic activity and fed demand for fuel.

Provisional government data on Monday showed refiners processed 4.58 million barrels per day (19.38 million tonnes) ofcrude oil last month, about 1.9 per cent higher than 4.50 million bpd processed in June.

On a year-on-year basis, refiners' crude oil throughput in July jumped about 9.6 per cent, while crude oil production fell about 3 per cent to 602,000 bpd (2.55 million tonnes), the data showed.

Fuel demand also climbed last month to its highest since April as pandemic restrictions and lockdowns were unwound inmost states.

Still, heavy monsoon rains in some regions caused large-scale flooding in early August, easing demand from gasoil and gasoline, preliminary sales data showed last week.

Refiners in India, the world's third-biggest oil importer and consumer, are set to invest ₹2 lakh crore ($26.96billion) to boost oil refining capacity by 20 per cent by 2025, Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas Rameswar Teli said this month.

Indian refiners operated at an average rate of 91.34 per cent of capacity in July, up from 89.59 per cent of capacity in June, the government data showed.

India's top refiner, Indian Oil Corp (IOC), last month operated its directly owned plants at 95.74 per cent capacity, as per the data. It expects to ramp up refining to full capacity within a quarter as demand picks up.

Reliance, owner of the world's biggest refining complex,operated its plants at 86.79 per cent capacity in July.

The state-run Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd is scooping up rising volumes of U.S. crude, people familiar with the matter told Reuters.

India begun selling oil from its Strategic Petroleum Reserve(SPR) to state-run refiners as it implements a new policy to commercialise its federal storage by leasing out space, three sources familiar with the matter said last week.

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