On December 27, Vice President M. Venkaiah Naidu is set to inaugurate a new LPG bottling plant, being set up for Rs 103 crore by Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited (BPCL) in Odisha’s Balangir district. The LPG plant will be spread across 23 acres and will have the capacity to produce 42 lakh cylinders per year.
As per Sanjay Sharma, BPCL’s State Head, this plant will be dedicated to the nation by the Vice president. Once the Balangir plant is set, it will be equipped to supply LPG cylinders to the consumers in 14 districts of Odisha including Balangir, Jharsuguda, Sundargarh, Sambalpur, Bargarh, Kalahandi, Sonepur, Koraput, Malkangiri, Nowrangpur, Boudh, Kandhamal, Raygada and Nuapada.
This will be the second such plant in Odisha. Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan had laid the foundation stone of the LPG bottling plant on May 21, 2018.
The statistical data of LPG, LPG bottling and LPG consumption are mentioned below:
-The number of LPG consumers in Odisha was 20.22 lakh in 2014 and it went up to 88.10 lakh in 2019 – an increase in the customer base by 335.71 percent during the last five years.
-In 2014 the LPG penetration in Odisha was 20 percent, which has increased to 81.3 percent by 2019 thus an increase of 61.3 percent in penetration.
-Further, the bottling capacity of the plants which was 1.48 crore cylinders in 2014, went up to 2.96 crores in 2019. The capacity of bottling will go up to 4.06 crore after the completion of all the seven bottling plants.
-BPCL has 21.59 lakh customers who consume approximately 78 lakh cylinders in a year. This consumption is expected to increase to 105 lakh cylinders in the next year.
This plant was crucial to meet the growing demand for LPG in Western and South-western Odisha. Considering the logistical advantage of the location, the historic town of Balangir was chosen for the same.