Petronet LNG Ltd, India's biggest liquefied natural gas importer, has more than doubled its net profit to Rs 397 crore in the third quarter ended December 31 as it handled record volumes of imported gas.
Net profit in October-December at Rs 397 crore was 133 percent higher than Rs 171 crore in the same period a year ago, Petronet Managing Director Prabhat Singh told reporters here.
"We handled 191 Trillion British thermal units (TBtus) in third quarter as compared to 140 TBtus of gas in the corresponding period of last year," he said.
While capacity utilisation at its 15 million tonnes Dahej terminal in Gujarat was 98 percent, lack of pipeline to take gas to consumers limited capacity utilisation of the 5 million tonnes Kochi terminal in Kerala to just 6 percent.
"The significant increase in profit is due to higher volumes processed and better efficiency achieved in the operations," he said.
Singh said the company registered the highest-ever profit of Rs 1,235 crore in April-December 2016, 85 percent higher than Rs 668 crore in the same period of previous fiscal. "This profit compares to highest PAT of Rs 1,149 crore in full fiscal." He said EPC contract for further expansion of Dahej to 17.5 million tonnes has been awarded and work is under progress as scheduled.
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