The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs today approved the proposal of the Department of Fertilizers to extend the duration of New Urea Policy-2015 for existing gas based urea unit from Apr 1, 2019 until further orders. The move will facilitate continuation of operations and regular supply of urea to farmers, an official release said.
The New Urea Policy-2015 was notified with the objective of maximizing indigenous urea production, promoting energy efficiency in urea production and rationalizing subsidy burden on the government, according to information available on the website of Department of Fertilisers.
As per the policy, the preset energy norms for gas based urea units fixed during earlier policies were mopped up and they were eligible for concessional rates on the basis of revised energy norms fixed for each group, effective Jun 1, 2015 to Mar 31, 2018 which is the simple average of pre-set energy norms of NPS-III and average actual energy consumption achieved during the years 2011-12, 2012-13 and 2013-14 or the pre-set set energy norms of NPS-III, whichever is lower.
At present, there are 31 urea units in the country of which 28 units are gas-based and the remaining three units use naphtha as feedstock.
