E20 retail outlets to cover entire country by 2025: Minister Hardeep S Puri

India taking global leadership role in Biofuels supply chain with successful launch of Global Biofuels Alliance.

Union Petroleum Minister Hardeep S Puri has said that the number of retail outlets retailing E20 is now more than 9300 and will cover the entire country by 2025. While interacting with the media recently, Puri talked about the steps taken by the government to augment India’s Exploration and Production (E&P) sector. He said that the “No Go” areas in EEZ have been reduced by almost 99 percent and 10 Lakh SKM area is now free in EEZ for E&P Activity. As on date, total operational area (active) under Nomination, Pre-NELP, NELP, CBM, DSF and OALP/ HELP is 3.27lakh Sq Km, he further said.

Puri stressed that Ethanol blending during ESY 2022-23 has saved approx. 509 crore litres of petrol resulting in savings of more than ₹24,300 crore of foreign exchange and expeditious payment of about ₹19 300 crore to farmers including net CO2 reduction of 108 lakh metric tonnes. The minister also talked about CBG blending Obligation (CBO) which will be voluntary till FY 2024-2025 and mandatory blending obligation would start from FY 2025-26.

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He claimed that with the successful founding of the Global Biofuels Alliance (GBA) in September 2023, India has assumed a leadership position in the global biofuels supply chain. “India has been successful to promote GBA as a pivotal path in the sustainability journey at COP 28 held in December 2023. GBA is also an important part of India’s agenda in WEF that is scheduled in Jan’2024”, he said.

The minister added that the government has taken a lot of steps to increase the share of Natural gas from present 6.3 percent to 15 percent in primary energy mix with an approximate 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 percent) has increased from 13.27 percent in 2014 to 98 percent in 2023. CGD Coverage (Area wise percent) has also witnessed an increase from 5.58 percent in 2014 to 88 percent in 2023. The remaining portion of the coverage area and population will be covered by the recently launched 12th CGD Bidding Round.