Indraprastha Gas Ltd (IGL) has signed an agreement with the Delhi Division of Northern Railway to supply piped natural gas (PNG) to 22 railway establishments across Delhi-NCR, replacing daily consumption of LPG and diesel at several institutional facilities.
The agreement will initially enable the supply of around 3,000 standard cubic metres of gas per day (SCMD), IGL said in a statement. This is expected to replace approximately 500 kg of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and 2,500 litres of diesel consumed each day.
The proposed conversion covers railway mechanised laundries, officers’ rest houses, base kitchens, running rooms, subordinate rest houses, and guard and ticket examiner lobbies across Delhi, Ghaziabad and Gautam Buddha Nagar. The mechanised laundries at Delhi Sarai Rohilla, Old Delhi, Anand Vihar Terminal, Hazrat Nizamuddin and New Delhi will use PNG for boiler operations.
The agreement was signed on Friday in the presence of senior officials from both organisations. IGL expects consumption under the initiative to rise to between 8,000 SCMD and 10,000 SCMD in the coming years as pipeline infrastructure and connectivity expand across its authorised geographical areas, including Ajmer, Banda, Rewari and Muzaffarnagar.
IGL Chairman Subhankar Sen said the partnership would support the replacement of LPG with natural gas across railway facilities. “Indian Railways has chosen IGL as its collaborative partner to replace LPG with PNG and this MoU will facilitate the substitution of a substantial quantity of LPG with natural gas, thereby helping reduce import dependence and the associated subsidy burden,” he said.
Delhi Division Railway Manager Pushpesh Raman Tripathi said the agreement would help reduce energy costs for Indian Railways. He added that PNG connectivity could subsequently be extended to railway hospitals and residential colonies, indicating a possible expansion beyond the facilities covered in the initial arrangement.
The move comes as IGL also works to increase household PNG connections under the government’s National PNG Drive 3.0. On October 28, the company announced promotional incentives that include a Rs 2,000 discount on standard domestic PNG registration charges and Rs 500 worth of free gas after activation of a connection. The initiative targets Delhi-NCR and other authorised areas through outreach programmes and partnerships with resident welfare associations and apartment owners’ bodies.
IGL Managing Director Kumar Shanker said the company was seeking to extend pipeline-based natural gas to a wider range of institutional consumers. The company operates city gas distribution networks across 34 districts in 11 geographical areas spanning Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana and Rajasthan. Its infrastructure includes more than 30,000 km of pipelines and over 1,000 CNG stations, serving more than 2.5 million CNG vehicles and nearly 3.5 million PNG-connected households.
The railway agreement will begin with the identified 22 establishments and an initial supply of 3,000 SCMD. Further expansion to hospitals, residential colonies and other railway facilities will depend on the extension of PNG connectivity and subsequent implementation decisions by the authorities.
