Coal news and updates

RIL hikes pet coke prices Rs 500/t for Aug loading

Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), India’s largest petroleum coke producer, has increased prices of its pet coke by Rs 500 per ton, for both retail and bulk customers, for loading in the month of August to more than a 12-month high, industry sources said.

With this, the company has increased prices for the 7^th consecutive month, taking a cue from the firmness in the prices of imported pet coke for delivery in India, they said.

Following the increase, RIL’s price of pet coke for retail consumers stands at Rs 6,100 per ton (ex-refinery), while for bulk consumers the price is at a discount of Rs 800-900 per ton or about Rs 5,200-5,300 per ton, depending on the quantity they lift.

The company had reduced the discount offered to bulk consumers to Rs 800-900 per ton from June 2016 against the Rs 1,200 per ton offered till May 2016.

The price details of other refineries are not available currently with ICMW, but it is expected that they too might have increased their rates by the same margin.

The price of imported pet coke from the US Gulf coast, which was quoted at around $52 per ton at the beginning of May and at $57-58 per ton by the middle of the month and at $70-72 per ton by third quarter of June, was quoted at about $75 per ton CFR India towards end of July, they said.

The price of Saudi Arabian origin pet coke towards end of July was quoted at about $60 per ton.

Though there was firmness in imported pet coke prices, a section of the industry expected RIL to not increase the price or do so by a small margin because the demand is on the lower side during the current monsoon season.

“It does not make any difference even if the material is not getting sold in July due to the monsoon factor because the refiner can stock the material as it expects to starts its gasification project sometime between September and November,” said a trader.

RIL will need about 100,000 tons of pet coke per month in each of its gasifiers and it plans to set up a total of 10 gasifiers.

Moreover, domestic refiners are producing at a normal rate and there is not much inventory left, they said.

Taking a cue for the sharp increase in pet coke prices during the past few months, many cement-makers, which had recently shifted to usage of pet coke, are believed to be considering a switch-back to coal.

But very few have switched so far as imported coal prices too have risen in recent days.

Having risen sharply during the past few months, it is to be noted that inventories of pet coke with Indian refineries had been falling consistently since the beginning of February this year. At Reliance, the inventory fell from a high of 170,000-180,000 tons at the beginning of January to 40,000-50,000 tons at the beginning of April and is currently down further.

Following table gives monthly retail prices of RIL’s pet coke for loading in respective months, starting January 2016: