Sugar, grain lobbies next push for ethanol cook stoves as Iran war continues to squeeze LPG supplies

Talking on the US-Israel-Iran war on Monday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi told the Lok Sabha that ethanol production had helped reduce the country’s import bill. “In the past 10–11 years, unprecedented work has been done on ethanol production and blending. A decade ago, India had only about 1.5% ethanol blending capacity. Today, we are close to achieving 20% ethanol blending in petrol. This has reduced oil imports by about 45 million barrels annually,” Modi said.

A cooking gas supply squeeze has prompted the government to increase the mandated time period between two LPG cylinder bookings. The Centre has increased the mandated booking gap to 25 days in urban areas and 45 days in rural and remote areas since war broke out in West Asia on 28 February with US-Israel attacks on Iran. Tehran’s subsequent retaliation and closure of the Strait of Hormuz, which handles about a fifth of all global oil trade, has crippled energy supplies to India, the world’s third largest buyer of crude oil.