India's Petronet Expects to Transport 1.5 mt of LNG via Trucks Annually

Petronet LNG is looking to sell about 1.5 million tonne (mt) of LNG annually in India by transporting it via trucks to customers not connected by pipelines.

“Our target is that in the next three years, we want to create a market of 1.5 mt of LNG through this route (road). The trucks could load at any terminal,” Prabhat Singh, managing director and CEO of Petronet LNG told Financial Express, a business daily.

He said the aim is to help replace usage of liquid fuel like diesel by LNG, especially in vehicles and small scale industries.

“The country’s LNG demand could double just by replacing one liquid fuel. That is the capacity,” he explained.

The company plans to buy about 100 trucks, which would be outsourced to fleet owners. “These trucks will run on LNG. For 1 mt of LNG, there is a need for more than 30,000 trucks. If we cater to 10,000 trucks, we would be able to utilise 0.1 million tonne.”

Initially, Petronet would deploy the tucks in Kerala – Kochi to Mangalore. This is primarily because its five million tonnes per annum re-gassification terminal at Kochi remains underutilised at mere 5% capacity due to lack of evacuation route, Financial Express reported.

Gradually, it would introduce the business model in routes from Mumbai to Delhi and Mundra to Ahmedabad.