E20 retail outlets over 9300; will cover entire country by 2025: Petroleum Minister Hardeep Singh Puri

Petroleum Minister Hardeep Singh Puri has said that the number of retail outlets retailing E20 is now more than 9300 and will cover the entire country by 2025.

With regards to India’s achievements in the Ethanol Blending Programme, the Petroleum Minister counted Narendra Modi’s success from 2014 to 2023. Through the EBP Programme, India saved Rs.78,118 crore foreign exchange in the last ten years. This helped in substituting 142 lakh MT of crude oil and lowering CO2 emissions by a massive 426 lakh MT.

The ethanol blending programme directly benefited the distilleries and farmers of the country. The Minister announced that in the last 10 years, a payment of Rs.1,15,623 crore was made to the distillers by Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs). Similarly, Rs.69,374 crore were paid to the farmers between 2014 and 2023.

Puri stressed that Ethanol blending during ESY 2022-23 has saved approx. 509 crore litres of Petrol resulting in savings of more than Rs. 24,300 crore of foreign exchange and expeditious payment of about Rs.19,300 crore to farmers including net CO2 reduction of 108 lakh metric tonnes.

India’s Quest For Biogas

The Minister also said that CBG Blending Obligation (CBO) will be voluntary till FY 2024-2025 and mandatory blending obligation would start from FY 2025-26.

The Minister said that the Government has taken a lot of steps to increase the share of Natural gas from present 6.3% to 15% in primary energy mix with an approx. investment of $67 Billion in Natural Gas infrastructure by next 5-6 years. This will translate into an increase in the gas consumption by over three-fold, from the present level of around 155 MMSCMD to over 500 MMSCMD by the year 2030.

Referring to the progress of City Gas Distribution (CGD) network since May 2014, Puri highlighted the increase in number of CGD networks for gas from 53 in 2014 to 300 in 2023; increase in PNG Connections from 25.4 lakh in 2014 to 1.19 crore in 2023; and increase in number of CNG Stations from 738 in 2014 to 6088 in 2023.

He noted that the CGD Coverage (Population wise%) has increased from 13.27 % in 2014 to 98% in 2023. CGD Coverage (Area wise %) has also witnessed an increase from 5.58 % in 2014 to 88 % in 2023. The recent launch of the 12th CGD Bidding Round will cover the balance portion of the coverage area and population.