OREANDA-NEWS. December 12, 2011. Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL), India's second-largest public sector refinery, is planning to spend Rs18,000cr to Rs20,000cr over the next five years to set up a petrochemical plant and expansion of the Kochi refinery.

The company is looking at diversification into petrochemicals by building a niche specialty chemical project at a cost of Rs5,000-6,000cr at Kochi, and plans to rope in a multinational partner for the project, BPCL chairman and managing director RK Singh has said.

"We are expanding Kochi refinery from 9.5mn tonne per year to 15mn tons a year," he said on the sidelines of the 3rd India Africa Hydrocarbon Conference here yesterday.