Third player in LPG market to be Indian!

Wednesday, 20 April 2011 00:24 - - {{hitsCtrl.values.hits}}

Petronet LNG, India’s biggest gas importer, yesterday announced that the company had received a request from Sri Lanka to enter the local market.

The managing director and CEO of the company A.K. Balyan speaking to India’s Economic Times has said the Company was looking at the opportunity. “Petronet is upbeat about expanding into new markets such as Sri Lanka,” he has said. Petronet LNG currently produces about eight million tonnes of liquefied natural gas (LNG) per year. It is in the process of doubling its business in the next five years.

The Company has planned to open a new terminal in Kochi in South India in close proximity to Sri Lanka.

It also aims to double imports of the fuel as it braces for serious competition from the proposed gas marketing joint venture of global major BP and Reliance Industries.

Petronet, which set up India’s first LNG terminal about a decade ago, also plans to sell gas using cryogenic trucks directly to consumers in regions not connected by pipelines of GAIL India, one of its promoters, to boost profitability of the company, the company’s managing director and CEO AK Balyan told Economic Times.