Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan on Monday said the government is keen to set up 5,000 Compressed Bio-Gas (CBG) plants in the next five years, as part of its efforts to bring down India's dependency on crude oil imports. We have aimed to set up 5,000 CBG plants by March 2023 with an investment of around Rs 1750 billion, Pradhan said. For this purpose, OMCs, who will be giving a production offtake guarantee for such plants, have invited expression of interest (EoI) from potential entrepreneurs to set up CBG production plants and make available CBG in the market for use in automotive fuels.
The EoI are available on the websites of the OMCs and can be filled from October 1, 2018 to March 31, 2019.
Stating that there will be no restriction on the technology choice, the Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas said the government is incurring Rs 750 billion capital expenditure for setting up infrastructure for city gas distribution network. Speaking at an event on the launch of the Sustainable Alternative Towards Affordable Transportation (SATAT), Pradhan said the CBG plants will provide an additional revenue source to farmers, and 75,000 direct job opportunities and millions of indirect jobs. The Minister also called for the participation of other Gas distribution companies and concerned departments.
The initiative is aimed at efficient management of municipal solid waste and in tackling the problem of polluted urban air due to farm stubble-burning and carbon emissions. Bio-gas is produced naturally through a process of anaerobic decomposition from waste/bio-mass sources like agriculture residue, cattle dung, sugarcane press mud, municipal solid waste, sewage treatment plant waste, etc. Compressed Bio-Gas is exactly similar to the commercially available natural gas in its composition and energy potential. CBG plants are proposed to be set up mainly through independent entrepreneurs. CBG produced at these plants will be transported through cascades of cylinders to the fuel station networks of OMCs for marketing as a green transport fuel alternative.
