April 2007

Indian Oiltanking Founds Terminal Joint Venture for Liquid Products at Mundra

Indian Oiltanking and Mundra Port & Special Economic Zone Ltd. sign an agreement to form a 50:50 joint venture that will own and operate a liquid-products terminal at Mundra, and develop it further. The new joint venture company is named Mundra Indian Oiltanking Ltd. (MIOL).

The terminal has a total capacity of 342,000 cbm and provides services to companies in petroleum refining/marketing, trading, and manufacturing. The product portfolio also includes bunker fuel, biofuels, vegetable oils, and chemicals. The MIOL terminal has several jetties with a draft of 15 m, as well as road and rail access, and therefore has good connections to the Indian hinterland. Considerable volumes of India’s crude oil imports are handled in the Gulf of Kutch, and planned refinery expansions as well as a burgeoning trade business hold out great potential for expanding MIOL’s storage and ship-handling business. Besides this, Mundra Port has a crude oil SPM for handling VLCC vessels at a distance of 7 km from the port, and pipeline connectivity to refineries.

All in all, the joint venture is an excellent opportunity for Oiltanking to enormously improve its already-strong position in India.