GAIL, Shell Energy join hands for ethane production in India
On Friday, India’s largest gas utility, GAIL said it had signed an agreement with Shell Energy India Pvt Ltd to explore ethane sourcing and other opportunities along the energy value chain.
In a bid to diversify the feedstock for its petrochemical plant, GAIL is looking to import ethane from ethane-surplus countries with matured export terminal infrastructure through water-borne transportation to India and to move it further through GAIL’s pipeline systems to demand centres, a company statement said.
The MoU envisages exploring prospects in the import and handling of different hydrocarbons which are essential chemical and petrochemical precursors, LNG for road transport, regasification of imported LNG and renewables, the statement added. GAIL is India’s largest natural gas company. It owns and operates a network of around 14,830 kilometres of natural gas pipelines spread across the length and breadth of the country. It commands around 68 percent market share in gas transmission and sells 53 percent of all gas sold in the country.
Ethane is expected to be produced in large volumes in North America due to the shale gas revolution, which has generated an abundance of liquefied natural gas (LNG) and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG). It is primarily used as a petrochemical feedstock to produce ethylene by steam cracking. Ethylene is the starting material for making a wide range of products — from packaging films, wire coatings, squeeze bottles, plastics, and synthetic rubber.
[With Inputs from IANS]
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GAIL a sleeping bureaucrat orgnization.