IOC & GAIL To Pay 5% More Hiring Charges to Adani for Odisha's LNG Facility

State-owned Indian Oil Corp (IOC) and GAIL India will pay Adani Group 5% more in hiring charges for using the private firm's upcoming LNG import facility at Dhamra in Odisha than their own similar terminal, Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said.

India's largest oil firm IOC, which recently commissioned a 5 million tonne liquefied natural gas (LNG) import terminal at Ennore in Tamil Nadu, as well as gas utility GAIL have "both technical and financial capability to develop their own LNG terminal," he told the Lok Sabha.

The two firms have, however, hired capacity in Adani's under-construction LNG import terminal at Dhamra.

IOC had in 2015 signed to use up to 60% of the terminal's capacity for importing gas for its refineries at Haldia in West Bengal and Paradip in Odisha. GAIL too had signed up for 1.5 million tonne of the terminal's regasification capacity.

"GAIL and IOC have agreed to pay the tolling charge of Rs 60.18 per million British thermal unit for the regasification facility at Dhamra LNG terminal with annual escalations in line with their respective contractual provisions," he said in a written reply to a question.

This charge compares to Rs 57.38 per mmBtu regasification charges for Ennore LNG terminal, he said.

"The regasification charges for Ennore and Dhamra terminals are inclusive of terminal charges, vessel-related charges, port charges, and any other port-related charges," Pradhan said.