A mega storage enhancing process is being undertaken by the Ceylon Petroleum Storage Terminal Limited (CPSTL) for the first time in Sri Lanka.
The total investment of the project on building and repairing nine tanks is Rs. 3.5 billion, making it the biggest such investment on this segment in the history of the institution.
Chairman/ Managing Director Ceylon Petroleum Storage Terminal Limited (CPSTL), M. Uvais Mohamed said that Sri Lanka’s fuel storage facilities have now evaporated to just 22 days to pump to the nation. The global average fuel buffer stock storage per country is around 60 days and this area was never addressed before.
“Work on the terminal has now commenced on building nine more storage tanks for which around Rs. 3.5 billion has been allocated and the project now in progress will be completed in 26 months adding the storage capacity by nearly 40 percent.”
CPSTL is a profit-making venture and part of the income will be used for this investment rather than going for borrowings. “Not only the Covid-19 pandemic, even wars and prolonged political unrest in fuel producing countries can halt the supply of fuel to Sri Lanka plunging the country into a total lockdown. This is why this investment is being made.”
He said that the storage was not improved to match the growing five percent average annual demand of the nation and swift action was initiated to add nine storage tanks urgently.
“Land, material and technical know-how for this is readily available with us and we envisage that with the completion of this project in 2023, the storage facilities will increase to 40 percent.” “It was also sad to note that one of the storage tanks that was damaged during the LTTE attack in the installation which could have been repaired too had not been done.”
“This tank was once for sale for scrap for a few million rupees and to replace a new one would have cost around Rs. 600 million. However, we are now investing around Rs. 100 million to restore this tank and put it to use.”