Hindustan Petroleum issued two rare tenders to import transport fuels for early November delivery, two sources familiar with the matter said on Tuesday.
The company sought about 34,000 tons of gasoline and 65,000 tons of gasoil for delivery between November 1 and 10 at the port of Mundra on the western coast of India, one of the sources said.
The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the tenders.
The tenders, closing on Tuesday, were issued after “operational issues” arose at the company’s Mumbai refinery, the second source said.
In a statement on Monday, the company said it sourced 54.6 million tons of crude oil from Hindustan Oil Exploration, which was found to be corroding its downstream units when processed in October.
The oil was “found to be causing operational issues including corrosion in downstream units, yielding suboptimal outputs and turning down production,” it said in a statement to the National Stock Exchange.
“Potential reasons are the very high salt and chloride content in the crude oil,” it added.
