UAE's largest oil producer, the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) on Tuesday said that it is interested in storing more oil in India's strategic petroleum reserves to boost energy ties with world's third-largest oil consumer. ADNOC is the only overseas company so far that has crude stored in Indian caverns. In fact, to incentivise the storage, India has already permitted ADNOC to export oil from the reserves if there is no domestic demand for it.

The UAE oil major wants to expand the "commercial scale and scope of this strategic reserves partnership," CEO Sultan al-Jaber said during a virtual interactive meeting of oil and gas CEOs with Indian Prime Minister Narenda Modi on the sidelines of the India Energy Forum by CERAWeek, according to an ADNOC statement.

As per present arrangement, ADNOC is storing crude at two of India's strategic reserves at Padur and Mangaluru in Karnataka.

ISPR has set up its storage sites at three locations with a combined capacity of 5.33 million tonne (mt) - Visakhapatnam (1.33 mt), Mangaluru (1.5 mt) and Padur (2.50 mt).

Apart from strategic reserve, ADNOC, along with Saudi Aramco and Indian state-owned refiners IOC, HPCL and BPCL, plan to build a 1.2-million barrel per day refinery in Ratnagiri on India's west coast. Jaber also invited Indian companies to invest in the country's downstream sector where it is investing close to $ 45 billion along with partners.
(IANS)