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Haldia's third oil jetty to start operations soon

Our Bureau

CALCUTTA, March 7

HALDIA dock's third oil jetty will start operation shortly. The dock authorities are awaiting the Indian Oil Corporation to declare the crude carrier, the first vessel to call at the jetty.

The dredging of the river in front of the jetty, currently in progress, will be over within a day or two. DCI's dredger, `Aquarius'', is on the job.

Built at a cost (civil construction) of Rs. 43 crores, the jetty will have the capacity of six million tonnes. However, it will handle only crude vessels, unlike the other two jetties (nos. one and two) capable of handling both crude and POL products.

Once the third oil jetty becomes fully operational, the pressure on the first jetty will be eased. Relieving the first jetty, which has become old and often been facing the problem of shoaling of the river in its front, of the traffic pressure is also ne eded.

The first oil jetty, according to Mr. Swapan Chakraborti, Deputy Chairman of Calcutta Port Trust in charge of Haldia dock complex, will henceforth handle only chemical carriers. Right now the jetty handles both crude and chemical carriers.

The throughput of the chemical traffic at Haldia, he says, is set for a big jump. A beginning has already been made with the commissioning of the PTA plant by Mitsubishi Corporation of Japan. Mitsubishi is to import about 7.5 lakh tonnes of paraxylene an d a couple of lakh tonnes of other chemicals annually.

The massive Haldia Petrochemicals Ltd, which is ready for regular operation shortly, will import about one million tonnes of naphtha and export large quantities of various petrochemical products. There will also be coastal shipment of various products. I OC will also use the jetty for handling LPG import. The companies such as Hindustan Lever Ltd and others are already using the jetty for importing ammonia and various chemicals.

It might be noted that the construction of the third oil jetty was completed within 18 months. The Haldia dock authorities declared the jetty ready for operation as early as September last year. However, operations could not be started immediately as its major user, IOC, had not finished its part of the work, namely, laying of the pipeline from the jetty to the terminal of the Haldia-Barauni crude pipeline and other supporting facilities. With IOC having completed the jobs now, the jetty will be operati onal as soon as the crude vessels start calling it.