Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited’s Kochi refinery has despatched the first indigenous superabsorbent polymer from its Propylene Derivatives Petrochemical Complex.
The lorry carrying the first consignment to Bapuji Surgical, Bangalore was flagged off by Ajith Kumar K, Executive Director (Kochi Refinery) in the presence of other senior officials of BPCL.
Superabsorbent polymer(SAP), the key component of sanitary napkins, and other incontinence products, is being produced for the first time in India.
The technology for this niche petrochemical is not available for licensing, and the R&D centre of BPCL took this challenge to develop an end-to-end process for the production of hygienic SAP, and a demonstration plant of 200 tonne per annum have been set up at Kochi Refinery. SAP is made using the in-house acrylic acid produced at Kochi Refinery.
The demonstration project will be followed by setting up a commercial plant of 50,000 tonne per annum capacity, thereby saving foreign exchange worth ₹1,000 crore to make India Atmanirbhar in this niche, and fast-growing segment, the company said in a statement.
Ajith Kumar said that, “the despatch of the first indigenous Superabsorbent polymer marks the culmination of the pioneering R&D effort of BPCL towards value enhancement of acrylic acid produced from the first world scaleunit installed in India by BPCL.”