The emergency release, announced on Friday, is intended to keep the Kesar Shore refinery operating while engineers restore the terminal’s tanker-control system. The refinery near Jamnagar, Gujarat, processes about 280,000 barrels of crude a day and supplies fuel to western India. The government also set aside ₹6.4 billion (about €65 million) to arrange replacement cargoes and transport.
The seven vessels waiting in the Gulf of Kutch carry a combined 5.1 million barrels, according to port traffic data reviewed by the energy ministry. No oil has spilled, and the ships remain outside the harbour. Officials said the release would begin on Saturday, with crude drawn from storage at Mangaluru and moved by coastal tanker.
A terminal locked out
The terminal stopped operations at 03:20 on Friday after its software showed conflicting berth-clearance signals. The operator, Kesar Shore Refining, said a routine update had caused the system to reject transfer requests across all four berths. It said staff halted work under safety rules and that there was no evidence of an outside intrusion.
Gulzar Sur, the terminal’s operations manager, said engineers were testing a separate control system before resuming work. “The screens disagreed about which berth had clearance, so we froze every transfer,” he said. The operator expects to restore one berth within 48 hours, but has not given a date for a full restart.
The screens disagreed about which berth had clearance, so we froze every transfer.
Gulzar Sur, terminal operations manager
India’s petroleum secretary, Alžběta Jašek, said the government had asked three refiners to share available crude and told fuel retailers to maintain normal deliveries. “There is enough stock in the country to prevent an immediate supply break,” she said. “The reserve release is a precaution, not a signal for consumers to panic-buy.”
Supply chains under strain
The terminal handles roughly 6% of India’s imported crude, making a brief stoppage manageable but leaving the refinery reliant on alternate supplies. The seven waiting ships include cargoes from Iraq and the United Arab Emirates, according to vessel-tracking data. Port officials said the ships had not been ordered to divert, though two could be sent to other berths if repairs drag on.
Lucy Heaney, an analyst at the fictional Aravali Energy Desk, said the disruption was unlikely to push up pump prices immediately. But she warned that a longer halt could force refiners to buy more expensive spot cargoes just as winter demand rises in parts of Asia. “The volume is replaceable; the timing and shipping costs are the problem,” she said.
The ministry said engineers would give a public update by Sunday evening and that the reserve draw would stop once normal crude deliveries resumed. Kesar Shore Refining has begun a technical review and said its other facilities were operating normally. The seven tankers remain offshore, while officials declined to say whether the five-day repair estimate could be shortened.
