Ernakulam to have 50,000 piped gas homes

Indian Oil Adani Gas Pvt. Ltd., which is implementing the City Gas Project in Ernakulam district, expects to provide 50,000 piped natural gas connections to domestic units by the end of 2019.

Work on the City Gas Project, launched in 2016, is moving along smoothly. The first piped gas connections were provided in Kalamassery in February 2016, and there are around 7,500 registered domestic users.

Gas connections have already been provided in five wards in the Kalamassery municipal area, and work is progressing in six wards in the Thrikkakara municipal area comprising 33 km pipeline, company sources said on Monday. The 27-km Kundannoor-Aluva line has been charged, and four compressed natural gas stations are functional along the pipeline at Maradu, Container Road, Kalamassery, and Aluva.

Pipelines in the municipal areas of Kalamassery, Thrikkakara, Maradu, Eloor, and Aluva will be charged by the end of 2019, company sources said.

With work progressing according to schedule in the Kalamassery municipal area, Cochin University of Science and Technology (Cusat) will be the first university in the State to get natural gas connection. This is expected in two months.

Pipe-laying work is in progress at the Cochin Special Economic Zone at Kakkanad too.

The industrial sector is keenly looking at the use of gas, and it is expected that the work on gas connections for units at the industrial estate in South Kalamassery will get under way soon. Commercial customers like shopping malls too are looking to meet their energy requirements by utilising natural gas availability.

Indian Oil-Adani Gas company sources said the attitude to natural gas connections had undergone a sea change, and that there was great demand for the fuel. They recalled the initial resistance from pockets in the district and compared it to the present scene where demand is booming.

CNG sales too have raised great expectations with an average sale of 150 kg a day.