The country’s largest refiner and petrochemical giant Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) has ramped up its production of medical grade oxygen from ZERO to 1000 MT per day, constituting more than 11% of the country’s total medical grade liquid oxygen production.
This oxygen is being provided free-of-cost to several State Governments across the country to bring immediate relief to over 1 lakh patients on a daily basis, the company said in a statement.
“Our plants at our Jamnagar refinery have been repurposed overnight to produce medical grade liquid oxygen that is being distributed across India. Our thoughts and prayers are with our fellow countrymen and women. Together, we will overcome these difficult times,” said Nita Ambani, chief of Reliance Foundation, philanthropic arm of the RIL.
The company has supplied over 15000 MT oxygen in the month of April to help nearly 15 lakh patients while since the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020, it has supplied over 55,000 MT of medical grade liquid oxygen across the country.
Moreover to transport the gas from its main refinery in Jamnagar and other manufacturing units, the company converted nitrogen tankers into transport trucks for medical grade oxygen, through innovative and safe processes that were approved by the Petroleum and Explosives Safety Organization (PESO), the relevant regulatory body of the Government of India.
Also, it also organised the airlifting of 24 ISO containers into India from Saudi Arabia, Germany, Belgium, The Netherlands and Thailand adding 500 MT of new transportation capacity for liquid Oxygen. These ISO containers will help in removing the transport constraints for medical grade liquid Oxygen in the country.
A new tank imported from abroad to transport medical oxygen.
| Photo Credit:
Special Arrangement
In addition, the company is airfreighting more ISO containers over the next few days.
“There is an immediate need to maximise India’s production and transportation capacities for medical grade oxygen. I am proud of our engineers at Jamnagar who have worked tirelessly, with a great sense of patriotic urgency, to meet this new challenge,” said RIL CMD Mukesh Ambani, who himself supervises the production and transportation of oxygen from its Jamnagar refinery.
“I am truly humbled by the determination and sense of purpose shown by the bright, young members of the Reliance family who have once again risen to the occasion and delivered when India needs it the most,” he added.
Prior to this pandemic, Reliance was not a manufacturer of medical grade liquid oxygen. However, as the need arose for medical grade oxygen with surge in the COVID-19 cases, its engineers quickly reconfigured and optimised current operations – designed for Refining and Petrochemicals grade oxygen – to produce high-purity medical grade oxygen.
“Medical grade liquid oxygen has to be produced in liquid form at -183°C with almost 99.5% purity, which poses extraordinary challenges and risks in production and maximising tonnage,” the RIL statement stated.
