Barauni Refinery in the Begusarai District of the state of Bihar in India was the dream project of Shrikrishna Sinha the first chief minister of Bihar.
History
Barauni RefineryThe second refinery of the country, Barauni Refinery, in the Bihar state of India, was built in collaboration with the Soviet Union at a cost of Rs. 49.4 crores and went on stream in July, 1964. It is situated 125 kilometres (78 mi) from Patna and was commissioned with a refining capacity of 1 million metric tonnes per annum (MMTPA) to process Assam (Naharkatiya) crude oil. The refinery was dedicated to the Nation by the then Union Minister for Petroleum, Prof. Humayun Kabir on 15th January 1965.
The initial capacity of 1 million tonnes per year was expanded to 3 million tonnes per year by 1969. The present capacity of this refinery is 6.100 million tonnes per year. Indian Oil Corporation has planned to expand its capacity from 6 million tonnes per year to 9 million tonnes per year at the cost of $1.94billion.
The initial capacity of 1 MMTPA was expanded to 3 MMTPA by 1969 with commissioning of AVU-2 and AVU-3. In its continuous endeavour to improve performance Additional Coker Unit and LPG Recovery Unit were commissioned in 1986. These provided a boost to the LPG yield of BR and increased the distillate yield. As a step towards producing unleaded motor spirit, a Catalytic Reformer Unit (CRU) was added to the refinery in 1997 and Barauni Refinery was accredited with ISO-14001. Haldia Barauni Crude Pipeline (HBCPL) was commissioned in 1999 paving way for un-interrupted crude supply to Barauni Refinery. The Refinery capacity was revamped to 6.0 MMTPA and matching secondary processing facilities such as Hydrogen Generation unit (HGU-1), Residue Fluidized Catalytic Cracker unit (RFCCU) & Sulphur Recovery Unit (SRU) were added in 2002 for technological advancements. For production of BS-II complaint high speed diesel, Diesel Hydro treating (DHDT) unit was also commissioned in the same year. Supply of Xtra Premium High Octane Petrol was implemented from July 2004. While BS-III complaint HSD was dispatched from April 2005 after in-house revamp of DHDT Unit.
Barauni Refinery was earmarked for its operational excellence in 2009 after winning the TPM excellence award in Category A. State-of-art eco-friendly technologies enabled the Refinery to produce environment-friendly green fuels complying with international standards. Barauni Refinery fully switched over to BS-III diesel w.e.f 1st June 2010. 1st batch of BS-III petrol was dispatched through Barauni Kanpur Pipeline (BKPL) on 13th August 2010. Bihar & Jharkhand was declared BS-III compliant since September 2010. New units like NHDT and ISOM for Motor Spirit Quality up-gradation were added in 2010.
In 2017, Coker – A unit was revamped for improving the reliability and energy efficiency of the unit. A New Bitumen unit with Biturox Technology was commissioned on 16th Jan’17 facilitating increased high sulfur crude processing capability at BR. In line with the auto-fuel policy 2025, Barauni Refinery started dispatch of BS-IV compliant diesel and petrol w.e.f Jan 2017.
To cater to the Crude requirement of Guwahati Refinery arising out of reduced Assam Crude supply, Barauni Refinery developed a facility to load LS crude in rakes utilizing the black oil gantry and started dispatching Crude oil from Jan’17 to Guwahati Refinery. DHDT unit was revamped and its capacity was increased from 2.9 MMTPA to 3.3 MMTPA for increased BS-IV HSD production. Prime G quality revamp was successfully completed to enhance BS-IV MS production as well as to facilitate HS crude processing. Bitumen production through Biturox unit commenced on sustained basis post revamp of Prime G unit. VG-40 grade Bitumen was produced and first TT loading of VG-40 was commenced on 21st Dec’17.
Transition to Auto Fuels
With a purpose to produce green fuels, Barauni Refinery commissioned new Prime G+ unit in August 2019. Prime G+ unit is part of BS-VI project undertaken by Barauni Refinery to comply with BS-VI fuel norms as mandated by MoPNG to roll out BS-VI quality auto fuels with effect from April 2020. With commissioning of this plant, Barauni Refinery will be able to produce BS-VI quality MS. The objective of the unit is to reduce sulfur content of Light Cracked Naphtha (LCN) gasoline as well as part of the Heavy Cracked Naphtha (HCN) gasoline, coming from the RFCC unit in order to meet the BS-VI fuel specification with 10 ppm sulfur. A licensed unit by M/s Axens, France, the design capacity of the new grass root Prime G+ unit is 486 TMTPA and the integrated capacity of old, revamped and new Prime G+ units now stands at 840 TMTPA. With replacement of catalyst in DHDT Unit, Barauni Refinery is prepared to produce BS-VI quality HSD. The secondary units of ARU & NSU were also successfully commissioned. Barauni Refinery despatched the 1st batch of green fuels, BS-VI grade diesel and motor spirit on the auspicious day of Dhanteras, 25th October 2019, becoming the second Refinery of IndianOil to achieve the mammoth milestone well ahead of the target, 1st April 2020, set by MoPNG. With conversion of existing products in the pipeline and tanks into BS-VI, Barauni Refinery became 100% BS-VI compliant in December 2019. Construction of other NHT and CCR block to augment BS-VI MS Production are going in full swing.