Mangalore Refinery and Petrochemicals (MRPL), has announced that the cost of expanding its refinery capacity to 15 million ton is likely to jump to over Rs 11,000 crore due to the recent rise in input cost. The earlier estimates were around Rs 8000 crore for the expansion plans.

RS Sharma, Chairman, MRPL said, “The expansion of Mangalore refinery capacity from 9.69 million ton to 15 million ton was budgeted at Rs 8,000 crore in 2006 but is now being estimated to cross Rs 11,000 crore.”
Mumbai-based company is engages in refining crude oil in India. The firm is a subsidiary of Oil & Natural Gas Corporation Limited.

MRPL has capacity to process 9.69 million metric tonnes per annum and is the only Refinery in India to have 2 Hydrocrackers producing Premium Diesel (High Cetane). It is also the only Refinery in India to have 2 CCRs producing Unleaded Petrol of High Octane.

The Company has recently posted a net profit of Rs 3466.00 million for the quarter ended December 31, 2007 as compared to Rs 1184.60 million for the quarter ended December 31, 2006.

At 12:45 pm, the stock was quoting at Rs 133 on NSE, up Rs 6, or 4%. It has touched an intraday high of Rs 136 and an intraday low of Rs 127. The trading volume for the counter stood at 2,443,749 shares.