SUSTAINABLE ALTERNATIVE TOWARDS AFFORDABLE TRANSPORTATION

SUSTAINABLE ALTERNATIVE TOWARDS AFFORDABLE TRANSPORTATION

Subject: Government Schemes

Context: Recently, the Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas & Steel presided over a virtual ceremony in which a number of initiatives were launched to provide major fillip to the SATAT initiative.

Concept:

• A Cooperation Agreement was signed by Oil and Gas majors including Indian Oil, HPCL, BPCL, GAIL and IGL, for the promotion and development of the SATAT.
• The Cooperation agreement provides for establishing a strong network for marketing the entire produced quantity of CBG Plants through various channels.

SATAT Scheme

• It was launched in 2018 by the Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas in association with Indian Oil Corporation Ltd., Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd. and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd.
• It envisages targeting production of 15 MMT of CBG from 5000 plants by 2023.
• It aims to set up Compressed Bio-Gas production plants and make CBG available in the market for use as a green fuel.

Compressed Bio-Gas (CBG)

• Bio-gas is produced naturally (through a process of anaerobic decomposition) from waste / bio-mass sources like agriculture residue, cattle dung, sugarcane press mud, municipal solid waste, sewage treatment plant waste, etc.
• After purification, it is compressed and called CBG, which has high methane content.
• It is exactly similar to the commercially available natural gas in its composition and energy potential.
• It can be used as an alternative, renewable automotive fuel with similar calorific value and other properties similar to CNG.