Coal news and updates

Petcoke output resumes at HPCL Bhatinda Refinery

December 4: HPCL-Mittal Energy Ltd has started production of petroleum coke from its refinery at Bhatinda from the beginning of November, thereby increasing availability of fuel grade coke for Indian consumers, industry sources said.

Production of petcoke was stopped from June 2 this year after a major fire at the refinery.

Post-resumption of operations, it has supplied a total of 13 rakes of petroleum coke (about 45,500 tons) to a cement-maker based out of Rajasthan, the sources said.

ICMW learnt that the material was supplied at a slightly lower rate to the cement-maker as the company wanted to quickly transport its material to create space for continued operation.

The price offered by HPCL-Mittal was almost at par, on delivered basis in Rajasthan, with rates offered by Reliance Industries, a source claimed.

As the cement-maker got domestic petcoke at a competitive price, it has deferred loading of one vessel of imported material to January 2015 from the earlier schedule of December 2014.

“The refinery started operation from the first week of November and is now operating at full capacity but the problem is that it does not have sufficient space to stock petcoke,” the source said.

“It will take some time for the old consumers of HPCL to come back to their platform for pet coke supplies because they have already shifted to some other source.

The refinery has a capacity to produce 90,000 tons of pet coke per month.