COMPREHENSIVE
AUTO FUEL POLICY – THE ONLY WAY TO FUTURE ROAD MAP OF FUEL QUALITY:
RAM NAIK
PARLIAMENTARY
CONSULTATIVE COMMITTEE DISCUSSES
"AUTO
FUEL POLICY"
YEAR
END REVIEW-2002
The Parliamentary
Consultative Committee attached to the Ministry of Petroleum &
Natural Gas discussed the "Auto Fuel Policy" in its meeting here
late evening yesterday. While, initiating discussions Shri Ram
Naik informed the members that the need for a comprehensive Auto
Fuel Policy has been keenly felt because of the increasing environmental
concerns. The Minister said the policy inter alia addresses questions
relating to suitable auto fuels, their availability, security
of supplies, vehicle technology, emission reduction in a cost
effective manner, fiscal measures for ensuring minimisation of
social cost of meeting environmental quality and institutional
mechanism for certification of vehicles and fuels, as also the
monitoring and enforcement measures.
Inviting suggestions
from the Members for formulation of National Auto Fuel Policy,
Shri Naik recalled that the Government constituted a Committee
of Experts of national repute, headed by Dr. R.A. Mashelkar, DG,
CSIR, to recommend an Auto Fuel Policy for the country. The Expert
Committee submitted its interim report on 1st January,
2002 and its major recommendations were accepted by the Government.
Thereafter, the Committee submitted its final report on 25th
September, 2002 on which the Government has invited the views
of general public and other stakeholders. The full report of the
Committee has been put on the website petroleum.nic.in for inviting
the comments from general public. The Government has also sought
comments from all the State Govenments and the concerned Central
Ministries through individual letters to the Chief Ministers and
Union Ministers.
The Minister outlined
the recent developments on the oil sector. He informed that the
guidelines for development of Petroleum Products Pipelines in
the post APM era were notified on 20.11.2002. In pursuance of
the decision mandating 5 per cent blending of ethanol in petrol
w.e.f. 1st January, 2003 as many as six new ethanol-petrol
blending projects have commenced. These are at Najibabad, Gonda
and Kanpur in U.P, Rajamundry in A.P. and Pathankot & Bhatinda
in Punjab, making a total of nine projects in operation in the
country. Award of 23 exploration blocks under NELP-III were approved
and 23 km long CNG pipeline connecting GT Karnal Road and Dhaula
Kuan was commissioned paving way for smooth dispensing of CNG
in Delhi. Shri Naik added that Retail outlets were allotted under
the discretionary powers of the Government to the next kin of
9 Government employees who sacrificed their lives on the 13th
December attack on the Indian Parliament.
Later responding
to Members’ queries, Shri Santosh Gangwar, Minister of State for
Petroleum & Natural Gas urged the members to send their valuable
suggestions on the recommendations of the Expert Committee for
finalising the vibrant Auto Fuel Policy. He also assured them
that different cleaner fuels such as 0.05% sulphur diesel and
petrol, LPG, ethanol blended fuels, CNG, etc., would be introduced
in more cities and towns. This will, however, be dependent upon
the factors like development of natural gas pipeline and availability
of natural gas in the case of CNG. He also said that the Government
is committed to curb the menace of adulteration and said that
the Government is constantly keeping a watch and following up
with the stringent action against the errant dealers. In addition
to setting up of a Specialised Body, the Anti-adulteration Cell,
the number of Mobile Labs have been increased from 17 to 50 for
surprise checks at the Retail Outlets.
While complementing
the Petroleum Ministry and the Oil Sector PSUs for excellent performance
through out the year 2002, the members desired that the sector
should continue and in fact step on to a higher level of performance
in future. The members called for providing the option of use
of fuels to the consumers by making available cleaner fuels in
more cities and towns. They pointed out that Anti-adulteration
drive should have greater focus on mofussil and remote area locations.
It was pointed out that the Auto Fuel Policy should have a long
term view taking in to consideration various R & D efforts
going on in the world to find new and more efficient fuels and
vehicular technology. They also called for protection of the interest
of the employees while undertaking disinvestment of oil PSUs.
Substantial improvements
have been done in petrol and diesel quality in India since 1996.
For this purpose, refineries have implemented major programmes
of quality upgradation. Investment of about Rs. 10,000 crore have
been made for petrol and diesel quality improvements to meet the
Bureau of Indian Standards Specifications made effective 1.4.2000.
India has totally phased out lead from petrol from February 2000.
While the developing countries took 10 to 20 years to phase out
lead, in India the same was achieved over a period of 6 years.
China and many other countries in the Asia Pacific region, South
America, Africa and elsewhere have not yet phased out lead from
petrol. In the four metropolitan cities, diesel with 0.05% max.
sulphur content is being supplied presently. It is comparable
with USA, Canada, Japan, Singapore, etc. Another important parameter
of diesel quality is high cetane number, which signifies better
ignition performance of diesel engine and lower emissions. The
cetane number has been increased from 45 to 48 from April 2000
which is higher as compared to most countries in the world, where
it varies between 40 and 51.
Petroleum Secretary
Shri B.K. Chaturvedi, and Additional Secretary (P&NG) Shri
M.S. Srinivasan, also attended the meeting. In addition senior
officers of the Ministry, CMDs and other senior officers of Oil
PSUs attended the meeting.
The following Members
of the Committee attended the meeting: S/Shri Lal Bihari Tiwari,
Jaswant Singh Bishnoi, Dr. Laxminarayan Pandey, Manibhai R. Chaudhari,
Prof. Rasa Singh Rawat, Shrichand Kriplani, Ram Singh Kaswan,
N.H. Diwathe, Kishan Singh Sangwan, Nagmani, Jai Prakash, Prasanna
Acharaya, Lakshman Seth, Ram Sajiwan, Ram Jeevan Singh, M.H. Gavit,
Shibu Soren, Dr. (Smt.) Sudha Yadav, Shyam Bihari Mishra and Harpal
Singh Sathi (all from Lok Sabha); Prof. Ram Deo Bhandari, N.R.
Dasari, Rajubhai A. Parmar, Prof. M.M. Agarwal and Ram Nath Kobind
(all from Rajya Sabha).
