OREANDA-NEWS. April 21, 2015. The Minister of State (I/C) for Petroleum & Natural Gas Shri Dharmendra Pradhan informed the Lok Sabha in a written reply today that an application for authorisation to market Aviation Turbine Fuel (ATF) was submitted to the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas from BP Exploration (Alpha) Limited (BPXA), a wholly owned subsidiary of BP plc on 11th June, 2014 claiming investment of US\\$477 million (including US\\$ 259 million of Capex investment) and proposed investment of US\\$2300 million.

To get marketing rights for transportation fuels, namely, Motor Spirit (MS), High Speed Diesel (HSD) and Aviation Turbine Fuel (ATF) applicant must meet the requirements as per Clause 3 of Marketing Resolution dated 8th March, 2002. The requirements interalia, include investment or proposed investment of Rs. 2000 crore in exploration or production, refining, pipelines or terminals leading to additionality to the existing assets and /or creation of new assets in the eligible activities.

With reference to this application dated 11th June, 2014, Directorate General of Hydrocarbons has reported that British Petroleum (BP) share of expenditure was US\\$508 million between financial year 2011-12 and financial year 2013-14 of which the capital expenditure (Capex) component and operational expenditure (Opex) component is US\\$171 million and US\\$337 million respectively. This did not meet the joint requirements of the Clause 3(I) and 3(IV) of the Marketing Resolution dated 8th March, 2002, and thus the application dated 11.6.2014 was rejected.