Oil minister Hardeep Singh Puri dismisses concerns about fuel adulteration

New Delhi: Oil minister Hardeep Singh Puri Friday dismissed concerns over fuel adulteration linked to the ethanol blending programme, contending that nationwide testing found just four cases across 107,000 petrol pumps so far.

Oil marketing companies have been conducting "rigorous testing" for fuel adulteration across the country, he said. "What did they find? They found four cases out of 107,000 petrol pumps with 6-7 crore (customers) going every day," said Puri, speaking at a CII conference.

Concerns over the impact of ethanol-blended petrol on vehicle engine performance and fuel economy have intensified in recent months, with some automakers previously attributing adulterated fuel for causing damage to vehicle parts.


Concerns have also been raised about chloride content exceeding safe thresholds in the blended fuel.

In a joint statement Friday, oil marketing companies said their testing didn't validate the "claims of 500 parts per million (ppm) chloride and presence of moisture" in the blended fuel.

Chloride monitoring is being done at multiple points of supply chain including refineries, distilleries, depots, terminals and retail outlets nationwide, the companies said. "Under the intensified monitoring programme, more than 160 samples have been analysed for chloride content in last few days and levels are in range of 0-3 ppm contrary to the claims of several hundred ppm," the companies said.