In the backdrop of the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) approving Rs 2,790-crore interest subvention for bank loans worth Rs 12,900 crore to sugar mills aimed at facilitating additional distillery capacities, the public sector oil marketing companies (OMCs) have floated a fresh tender for procurement of 910 million litres (ML) of ethanol.
In sugar season 2018 (October-September), the OMCs requirement of ethanol for blending with petrol stood at 3,136 ML and for the current 2019 season. The same had been estimated at 3,300 ML.
So far, ethanol blending with petrol has reached 5.8 per cent. States like Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh (UP), Uttarakhand, Punjab-Haryana, and Karnataka have clocked more than 8.5 per cent blending with Maharashtra and UP having achieved 9 per cent or even higher blending owing to high availability of sugarcane.
