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INDIAN SCENARIO

4.2.2.1
PETROLEUM COKE FROM INDIAN REFINERIES

Total petcoke generation in India in 2013 was about 12 MMTPA and new refining capacity of
about 10 MMTPA will be added soon. Reliance alone produces about 6.4 MMTPA at single
point at Jamnagar [8]. Therefore a surplus availability is expected.
Most of the plants are of smaller capacity and coker is not available in all the refineries.
However several large refineries having coker unit are considering the option for producing
power and hydrogen through IGCC. As for example, Reliance is going ahead with installing a
pet coke gasification facility at Jamnagar, which will produce hydrogen as well as feedstock
for chemicals. It is also likely to have carbon capture facility [8]. Many other refineries are also
considering similar projects. For smaller refineries with coker, a group of refineries may decide
to go for a gasification plant to produce methanol or DME. This will ensure economic capacity
and uninterrupted supply of feedstock. Presently, most of the Indian refineries whether having
coker or not are disposing the residue in their captive power plant. There is a possibility of
using these residual materials or coke and co process with coal or biomass. The price offered
by the methanol plant has to be more than the revenue generated by refineries by selling the
pet coke in the market or use the residue in their power plants.

4.2.2.2

OFF GASES FROM INDIAN REFINERIES
The possible usage of refinery off gases has been discussed in the earlier section. The scenario
is not much different in India. The earlier practice of burning as flare has almost non-existent
today and all the hydrocarbon gases are being used by the refineries in different sections
and even for recovery of some valuable hydrocarbons. These quantities are not sufficient for
standalone methanol plant. It may be possible to use some of the lower hydrocarbon streams
via reforming in small scale. Since there are several streams of low calorific value gases at
different locations of a refinery, there are often some logistic problems in mixing and processing
them together. Refineries could explore the best economic solution for use of such low calorific
value hydrocarbon gases, including methanol, DME or syngas production.

4.2.3
BIOMASS AS FEEDSTOCK FROM INDIAN SOURCE

India has several bio gas based plants for power generation, however these account for only
about 5% of the total power generation in the country. The largest three plants are of 1 to 1.5
MW each, in Tamil Nadu. All these plants only produce power [114]. There are many small and
medium capacity gasification plants for power generation operating in India, based on Indian
technology for the gasifier. These plants generate producer gas having hydrogen to carbon
monoxide ratio of the order of 1. About 2 Kg of biomass or wood chips is required for 1 KWH.
Many of these plants deliver power at reasonable cost [125].

Ministry of New and Renewable Energy of India has been quite active in the area of utilization
of mixed biomass and waste for production of bio fuels but most of these development projects
funded are for bio ethanol or bio gas production including bio CNG [64]. TERI has been doing
intensive research in the area of biomass gasification for power generation in India since 1980.
They can provide technology for gasifiers but are not focused towards methanol production via
syngas [65].

Methanol and DME Production: Survey and Roadmap | 2017 65