Mangalore: ‘Bhoomi Pooja’ Held for ISPRL Crude Oil Storage Project
Pics by Dayananda Kukkaje
Daijiworld Media Network—Mangalore (RS/CN)
Mangalore, May 28: The ‘Bhoomi Pooja’ for a major crude oil storage project by Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserves Limited (ISPRL) was held in Kalavar Padav village near Bajpe on Wednesday May 27.
ISPRL is a subsidiary of the Oil Industry Development Board of India. S Vijayanand, chief of the Mangalore unit of ISPRL, performed the ‘pooja’ with A G Pai, the chief operating officer of MSEZ, and S Shivaraman, chief of the construction company Engineers India Ltd.
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After the ceremony, S Vijayanand informed the media that the government of India has planned to store five million metric tonnes of strategic crude oil reserves in underground rock caverns.
He added that as part of this, places have been selected in Vishakapatnam, Udupi, and Mangalore for this purpose. He said that the completion of these three projects India will help store reserves of petroleum for up to 14 days in case there is a disruption in the supply from the Middle East.
“The project here will be completed in 2012. The entire storage plant will be made in rock caverns which have been proved immune to war, earthquake, sabotage, terrorist attacks, and natural calamities”, said Vijayanand.
A G Pai assured that there would be no health hazards during its operation and added that in foreign countries, such plants are in residential areas.