From 35 to 60 tonnes, city CNG supply to spike by year end
Times of India | 6 September 2025
Kolkata: In what seems to be a sort of relief for the CNG vehicle owners in Greater Kolkata, Bengal Gas Company Ltd (BGCL) has increased the supply of natural gas to 20 retail fuel stations in the city and its adjoining areas.
BGCL, a 74:26 joint venture between Gail and the Greater Calcutta Gas Supply Corporation, a state PSU, on Thursday received approval from the Petroleum and Explosives Safety Organisation (PESO) to start operations of its Kalyani station. The company claimed that it had increased the CNG supply to Kolkata from 35 tonnes a day to 40 tonnes a day.
BGCL CEO Anupam Mukherjee said: "We have received the PESO approval to start the Kalyani station.
It will help us mitigate the supply woes to some extent. We have set a target to supply 60 tonnes a day to Kolkata and parts of Howrah, Hooghly, and the two Parganas by this Dec."
Currently, BGCL transports CNG in cascades from Panagarh for the purpose of supplying the gas to its retail outlets in Greater Kolkata. The transportation takes nearly 5-6 hours to cover 170km distance. The long transportation time, coupled with traffic jams, result in delays in the arrival of CNG at the retail outlets.
As a result, vehicles need to queue up at the outlets for hours almost everyday. The unavailability of CNG has forced many car owners to drive their vehicles on petrol.
"I was told that the gas would be available in abundance in the city, and that prompted me to buy a CNG car three years ago. But still, the problem persists," Sunil Kumar, a CNG car owner from Kestopur, said.
Chandan Patra, a luxury taxi owner-cum-driver, said: "For the last 15 days, I didn't face much problem in getting CNG.
But before that, the pump near Rubi crossing used to dry out in the afternoon, and so I had to wait for 2-3 hours." Sankar Ghosh, a petrol pump owner in the Bagbazar area, informed that some 15 days back, the cars had to wait overnight outside his pump to get CNG.
Acknowledging the problem, Mukherjee informed that for about 13,000 CNG vehicles in the city, currently, the demand for gas has zoomed to around 100 tonnes a day. "After Kalyani, we aim to start another station at Jhapa in Hooghly's Mogra in Oct, which will increase the CNG supply by another 20 tonnes a day" he added.
There are also plans to set up two more stations — one at Bhatpara and another 20-tonne station at the Wireless Crossing in Barrackpore.
Currently, BGCL has 20 operational CNG retail outlets in Greater Kolkata. The construction of another 13 stations has been completed but are yet to start operations due to a lack of supply. The company plans to construct another five CNG retail outlets by next March. "A retail station generally sells around 1,500 kg of CNG a day. On that basis, after the start of operations at Kalyani, Mogra, and Bhatpara stations, we will be able to cater to the demand of 38 retail outlets," Mukherjee said.