By Bizodisha Bureau, Bhubaneswar, October 3, 2018: The Centre on Wednesday urged the Odisha government to facilitate setting up of the proposed Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) facility at Chandikhol.

The joint secretary in the Union Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, Sanjay Sudhi, met Odisha Chief Secretary A P Padhi here at the state secretariat on Wednesday and conveyed the Centre’s move regarding the SPR set up.

The facility will be an underground strategic oil reserve for eastern India and generate employment for 4,000 people during the construction phase, Sudhi told media persons and informed that the centre has sought cooperation of the state government in establishing the project.

He said the Odisha government has assured the central government of support in setting up the SPR.

Sudhir said the proposed SPR in Jajpur district with 4 million metric ton capacity will be built over 400 acre of land, at an investment of Rs 6,500 crore. The project would also include a pipeline from Chandikhole to Paradip.

He further said that experts from both the Centre and the state government will soon meet to discuss the modalities of implementation of the project.

The Union Cabinet had approved establishment of additional 6.5 million metric ton SPR facilities at two locations in Odisha and Karnataka.

At present, the SPR – an emergency fuel store, has total 5.33 MMT (million metric tons) strategic crude oil enough to provide 10 days of consumption which are maintained by the Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserves Limited.