May 4, 2021

New Delhi: Rising to the occasion, India's oil and steel industries have cut down their production of industrial oxygen and have started producing liquid oxygen so that the patients of Covid-19 do not have to face any difficulty.

Several public sector undertakings (PSUs) including private sector companies -- Indian Oil, BPCL, SAIL, Vedanta, JSPL, and Tata Steel -- are diverting large portions of industrial oxygen they produce for manufacturing for Covid -19 patients.

Liquid oxygen produced by these two industries account for sixty percent of total oxygen produced in the country at this point. India is producing 7000 MT of liquid oxygen everyday. Union Minister for Steel, and Petroleum and Natural Gas Dharmendra Pradhan is personally monitoring oxygen being produced by PSUs.

Mental companies are also rising to the occasion. Hindustan Zinc (HZL), ESL and Sesa Goa Iron Ore Business have stepped in to augment oxygen supplies to Covid-19 patients as part of the Vedanta Cares initiative. 

Sterlite Copper has also applied to get approval for oxygen supply from the Supreme Court and has received the approval to supply oxygen from its Tuticorin plant. Sterlite Copper's oxygen plants have a capacity to produce 1,000 tonnes of oxygen daily. /BI/