The joint venture between Indian Oil Corporation and Malaysia's Petronas on Tuesday inaugurated its second LPG terminal at Ennore near Chennai in a bid to enhance the availability of cooking gas and meet the soaring demand in the region.

Established at a cost of Rs 546 crore, the facility currently boasts a capacity of 600,000 tones per annum. The capacity can later be expanded to 1.2 million tones per annum.

The new facility will cater will cater to LPG needs of Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka.

Mrinal Roy, chief executive of Indian Oil-Petronas Ltd (IPPL), said, "It will end long haulage of LPG cylinders saving logistics cost of PSU oil firms and decongesting roads."

As per the Government's Vision 2015 document, the demand for LPG imports will likely reach around eight million tones by the year 2021-22. By that time, the country's domestic production of the cooking gas will cross an estimated of 15 million tones per annum.

Apart from offering offer LPG cylinders, the joint venture will offer bottling services for public-sector oil marketing companies on BOOT/BOO basis from Europe as well. The facility may also increase the volume of technical services, such as road tanker purging and bulk LPG reticulation facilities, for its industrial customers.

Indian Oil is also about to start construction work on a five-million tones per annum LNG terminal at Ennore, which is emerging as a strategic site for petroleum business.