MRPL to Lease Crude Storage in Mangalore Reserve

The company plans to lease 300,000t (2.2mn bl) in the 11mn bl Mangalore cavern. ISPRL is also selling some Abu Dhabi Upper Zakum crude to MRPL from the same Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) but the volume being bought could not be determined. MRPL's 300,000 b/d Mangalore refinery processed the Abu Dhabi grade recently, a market participant said.

ISPRL is planning to sell some crude from the state share of the Mangalore storage, its chief executive HPS Ahuja told Argus, but did not share any details on the volume. Abu Dhabi's state-owned Adnoc also stores crude in the same SPR and has access to half the capacity under a government-to-government agreement.

ISPRL, which manages the country's strategic stocks, would trade the equivalent of 20pc of the reserves' total capacity and lease another 30pc to third-party entities, Ahuja said last month. The 50pc of capacity available for commercialisation is in addition to the government-to-government agreement between India and the UAE.

India's SPR has around 39mn bl of capacity, with two other sites at Vishakhapatnam with 9.8mn bl and Padur with 18.4mn bl.