Mumbai: Oil refining and marketing company Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd (BPCL) plans to invest ₹1-lakh crore in various businesses over the next five years, Chairman and Managing Director Arun Kumar Singh said on Monday.
The investment includes ₹30,000 crores in refining and petrochemicals, ₹20,000 crores in gas, ₹18,000 crores in upstream, ₹18,000 crores in augmenting marketing infrastructure, ₹5,000 crores in renewables, and ₹7,000 crores in building 1G and 2G ethanol plants. The investment will be funded through a mix of internal resources and borrowings.
BPCL, according to Singh, has acquired the warrants held by the government of Madhya Pradesh in its wholly-owned subsidiary Bharat Oman Refineries Limited (BORL), paving the way for the eventual merger of the refinery located at Bina with BPCL. This will allow significant logistics and operational synergies leading to overall value enhancement.
Singh said that natural gas, petrochemicals, renewables, biofuels, and electric mobility will be central to BPCL’s growth strategy. The firm has also formed a dedicated new business unit to venture into organised consumer retailing, leveraging its marketing network strengths.
BPCL said it is awaiting a response from market regulator SEBI to its proposal seeking a waiver from open offers by the new private owner of BPCL in Petronet LNG Ltd and Indraprastha Gas Ltd, the two companies co-promoted by the state-run oil firm following strategic disinvestment.
“Based on SEBI response, we will take an appropriate decision what to do,” Singh said. Provisions are also being made to “protect” BPCL’s LPG consumers after strategic disinvestment, he said.
BPCL has some 8.5 crore LPG consumers accounting for more than 26 percent market share. It also has about 2.1 crore LPG consumers under the ‘Ujjwala Yojana’.
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