New Delhi, March 23 -- India's strategic oil reserves, designed to provide cover for about 9.5 days of supplies during disruptions or price shocks, are currently sitting at only two-thirds capacity, the Rajya Sabha was informed on Monday.

India, the world's third-largest energy consumer and heavily dependent on imports for about 88 per cent of its crude oil needs, has built strategic underground storage facilities with a total capacity of 5.33 million tonnes across three locations -- Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh, and Mangaluru and Padur in Karnataka -- to store crude oil used for producing fuels such as petrol and diesel.

"Quantity of the crude available in the caverns varies depending on market conditions," Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas Suresh Gopi said in a written reply in the Upper House. "Currently, ISPRL has around 3.372 million tonnes of crude stock available, which is around 64 per cent of the total storage capacity."

Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserve Ltd (ISPRL) is the special purpose vehicle that established strategic petroleum reserves (SPR) facilities with a total capacity of 5.33 million tonnes of crude oil at three locations, which can act as a buffer for short-term supply shocks.

"The actual reserve is a dynamic number depending on the stocks and actual consumption, both of which are not static," he said.

The stockpile has been in focus since the breakout of war in the Middle East snapped the supply of crude oil, natural gas and LPG from the Gulf countries to India. India spent USD 110 billion in the first 11 months of the current fiscal year on importing about 226 million tonnes (or 88.7 per cent of oil needs).

Half of this came from countries like Saudi Arabia, Iraq and the UAE, which use a narrow sealane of the Strait of Hormuz for shipping the oil and gas.

Besides, USD 12.4 billion was spent on importing half of the natural gas consumed in the country from April 2025 to February 2026. Also, 60 per cent of its LPG came from overseas.

As much as 85-95 per cent of LPG and 30 per cent of the gas came through the strait. While the disruption in crude oil has been partially offset through alternative sources, such as Russia, West Africa, the US and Latin America, gas and LPG supplies to industrial and commercial users have been curtailed.

Gopi said in July 2021, the government had approved the establishment of two additional commercial-cum-strategic petroleum reserve facilities with a total storage capacity of 6.5 million tonnes, -- Chandikhol (4 million tonnes) in Odisha and Padur (2.5 million tonnes) in Karnataka.

"Work for construction at Padur has been awarded on October 1, 2025," he said.

In July 2021, the government also approved the commercialization of Phase -I SPRs under which an agreement was signed between Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC) of the UAE, and ISPRL, permitting ADNOC to use Cavern-A with 750,000 tonnes capacity at Mangalore.

"The current total national capacity for storage of crude oil and petroleum products is 74 days, which includes the capacity of storage facilities of the oil marketing companies (OMCs)," he said. "The actual reserve is a dynamic number depending on the stocks and actual consumption, both of which are not static."

Gopi said to ensure the security of crude supplies and to mitigate the risk of dependence on crude oil from a single region, oil and gas public sector enterprises (PSEs), which are Board-run entities, source crude oil from diverse sources depending on their technical and commercial considerations.

"Currently, these PSEs import crude oil from 41 countries, including new suppliers like the USA, Nigeria, Angola, Canada, Columbia, Brazil and Mexico in addition to traditional suppliers in the Middle East such as Iraq, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Kuwait and Qatar," he added.

Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.