“Nine companies have purchased the bid document. Some firms, those are not involved in the pipeline business, such as Larsen & Toubro (L&T) and GMR has also bought the bid documents. We will extend the bid submission dates by another two months from the present closing date,” L Mansingh, chairperson at PNGRB said.
Other companies who have purchased the application-cum-bid documents comprise of Engineers India Limited, Essar Projects, Nagarjuna Constructions and GAIL (India) Limited (GAIL). The first pipeline will be built from Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh to Vijapur and then branching up to Bhilwada in Rajasthan for 1,585 kilometers.
The second pipeline will emerge from Mehsana in Gujarat till Bhatinda in Punjab for 1,670 kilometers. The third pipeline will be from Bhatinda till Jammu and Srinagar for through Moga-Kapurthala-Gurdaspur-Pathankot-Kathua spanning about 300 kilometers and spur-lines to Firozpur, Jalandhar, Hoshiarpur, Amritsar, Batala, Jammu & Srinagar spanning about 440 kilometers (total of 740 kilometers with a design capacity of at least 15 mmscmd).
GAIL and Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation (GSPC) group have submitted expression of interest (EOI) on pipelines on the similar routes. PNGRB after studying the EOIs and taking proper advice from the consultants, finally decided to invite bids on the three new routes for gas pipelines, said Mansingh.
