Pipelines will be laid for 23.567 km covering 16 villages in Vellore district for the Ennore-Thiruvallur-Bengaluru-Puducherry-Nagapattinam-Madurai-Tuticorin (ETBPNMT) Natural Gas pipeline project, according to an official of the Indian Oil Corporation Limited (IOCL).
Allaying apprehensions of farmers about the project, S. Thangaraj, General Manager (Construction), Pipelines Division, IOCL, presented the details including safety aspects to a gathering of farmers during the monthly grievance day meeting chaired by Collector S. A. Raman on Thursday.
“In Vellore district, the project will cover 16 villages – four in Katpadi taluk and 12 in Walajah talk. It will start at Ponnai and end at Karai,” he said. The project, meant to cover 1,250 kilometres in Tamil Nadu, is being executed at a cost of ₹ 4,500 crore.
Explaining further, he said the Central government wanted a natural gas grid in the country, and this ETBPNMT pipeline project is a part of it. IOCL has been authorised by the Petroleum Natural Gas Regulatory Board to lay the pipelines.
Under this project, natural gas will be taken from the Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) import terminal at Kamarajar Port in Ennore. “LNG brought in ships from Australia and Russia will be stored in a cryogenic tank at the port. Nearly 75% of the works at the terminal has been completed and it is scheduled to be commissioned in June 2018,” he said.
LNG, he said, was green fuel better than petrol, diesel and kerosene. The pipeline network will be extended from Ennore to Bengaluru via Tiruvallur and Chittoor, from Ennore to Puducherry, Nagapattinam, Tiruchi, Madurai, Tuticorin via Ramanathapuram.
“The natural gas will be transported through pipelines like piped gas supply” Mr. Thangaraj said.
Noting that this was in no way similar to hydrocarbon exploration projects, he said the aim of the presentation was to clear the apprehensions among farmers. “It is a misconception that farmers will not be able to take up cultivation if the pipeline is laid near a farming land. This will be an underground steel pipeline laid six to seven feet below the normal ground level,” he said.
Regular maintenance of the pipelines will be taken up to protect it from external and internal corrosion, he said.
The official assured that the pipelines were safe. There are line patrolmen who will walk along the pipeline everyday. Their movement will be monitored by GPS, he noted. “The pipelines are outside habitat areas. There will be no leak or hazard. We are prepared for any eventuality and conduct regular mock drills,” he said.
