Ramesh cautions against use of biofuels in automobiles
26 August 2010;deccanherald.com:New Delhi: Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh Thursday said use of bio-fuels in automobiles is not a sustainable option for India given the food security concerns in the country. "We should take a cautious approach towards it (bio-fuel) as its production would require land and crops. It will be difficult as there are other needs like food security in the country," Ramesh said on the sidelines of an automobiles conference. Produced from crops, plants and trees, biofuels are cleaner than fossil fuels. Ramesh said there are differences between India and other countries which produce bio-fuels like Brazil. The population here is enormous and there is a scarcity of land, he said. “We are a country of a billion people adding ten million every year, and we have serious food security issues. Diverting land or crops for bio-fuels cannot be a sustainable option,” he said. In 2007, the government had mandated addition of 5 percent of bio-fuel (ethanol) in Diesel.Ramesh also said other options like compressed natural gas (CNG) are more viable. He said the policies in the automobile sector need to change to promote greater use of CNG. He added that the Diesel prices should be deregulated like petrol so as to discourage its usage and encourage the usage of non-pollutant fuels like CNG.
26 August 2010;business-standard.com:Kalpana Pathak:Mumbai: Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries (RIL) is slugging it out with fuel retailers in Gujarat. Around 75 outlets in the state, where the company runs two refineries, have decided to exit the RIL dealership. Of the 225 operational retail outlets that RIL has in Gujarat, 150 are dealer owned, dealer operated (DODO) or company owned, dealer operated (CODO). The other 75 are company owned, company operated (COCO). “Around 75 dealers recently gave a clean exit letter to RIL. But the company has not responded. We have been running the outlets in losses for over four years now. The rates at which RIL sells its fuel is very high and we do not get customers,” said Sunil Golwala, President, Gujarat Reliance Petrol Pump Dealers Association. The dealers say they invested between Rs 2 crore and Rs 4 crore in each outlet. Depending on the location, the cost of land is between Rs 1.5 crore and Rs 3 crore, with another Rs 30 lakh to Rs 1 crore thrown in on maintaining the services at the outlets. The company takes care of the services cost at CODO outlets. “It has been a completely loss-making proposition for us. Four years of investment and we have not gained anything substantial so far,” said a dealer, who did not wish to be named. ‘Money back or FIR’ Every dealer gave the company a security deposit between Rs 13 lakh and Rs 33 lakh, depending on the site. With the dealers exiting, RIL may have to release the deposit. Golwala said if the company did not revert in the next 10 days, the dealers are planning to file a police complaint against Mukesh Ambani. An RIL official declined to comment on the matter. An email to RIL remained unanswered. RIL had earlier negotiated on buying the sites from the dealers. “While we have already been making losses, the company said it can buy back our sites. But it offered only Rs 2 crore for a site worth Rs 4 crore. We had met Parimal Nathwani, group president, Reliance Industries, who said he will grant us clean exit documents but nothing has happened so far,” added Golwala. Some of these dealers plan to approach the public sector oil marketing companies— Indian Oil Corporation, Bharat Petroleum Corporation and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation — and seek dealership. RIL had in May 2008 closed its outlets due to mounting losses, as it was selling fuel much above the subsidised retail prices of state-owned oil companies. Last October, RIL began re-opening its retail outlets. So far, the company has re-opened 667 outlets in the western and southern regions, though it has less than 0.5 per cent market share, with a total of 1,450 fuel retail outlets, according to industry players. While the going has not been smooth for RIL in petroleum retailing, Essar Oil is looking at expansion in the Indian market. It has 1,341 fuel outlets operational and plans to scale up its retail outlets to 1,700 by March 2011. Essar Oil says it follows the franchisee model, which unlike a company owned and operated model, allows it to take the market swings. Most of its outlets are in the western part of the country. It says it would expand in the southern parts. Another private retailer, Shell India, the domestic arm of Royal Dutch Shell Plc, has offered for sale around 20 of its 80 operational retail outlets and around 20 sites acquired for setting up such outlets. It has approached oil marketing companies, both public and private, regarding this.
26 August 2010;economictimes.indiatimes.com:Pankaj Doval:MUMBAI: Famed Indian engineering is set to design the heart of British marque brands Jaguar and Land Rover (JLR) as Tata Motors, that bought them in 2008 from Ford, looks at joint development of compact engines with JLR. PM Telang, MD of Tata Motors' India operations, told TOI that the two companies intend to jointly develop smaller engines that could be strapped on vehicles of all the three brands. He said, while the portfolio of Tata Motors was growing, JLR was facing pressure due to emission norms in Europe. "So they will have to start downsizing their engines and there will be some areas, where there will be synergy between these two companies. All this will be examined to find out if there is some interplay available for us to take joint engine development which will meet some of their requirements and some of Tata Motors' requirements. The engines for JLR are currently supplied by Ford, which the brands before Tata Motors bought them in a $2.5 billion deal. However, stricter emission norms in Europe and supply constraints has prompted Tata Motors to look at developing newer engines, especially smaller and more efficient ones. "The current range of engines that they use, which are from Ford, are fairly large engines. For passenger cars, they are upwards of 3 litres and going up to 5.5 liters," Telang said. While Telang refused to elaborate further, it is believed that Tata Motors may chip in with its knowledge in compact engines as well as low-cost development philosophy to combine with the R&D expertise of JLR. And the move to develop smaller engines comes at a time when Tata Motors is looking at assembling the Land Rover in India, to bring down the cost of the off-roaders and increase their potential in the market. "We have started retailing Jaguar and Land Rover in India and got a good response. Now we are examining the market for CKD (completely-knocked down) operations for larger volumes," Telang said.
26 August 2010;economictimes.indiatimes.com:NEW DELHI: The country's largest carmaker Maruti Suzuki is understood to have considering setting up a third plant at its Manesar unit that can entail an investment of about Rs 1,700 crore. According to industry sources, the company is mulling an additional plant that will have an annual capacity of rolling out 2.5 lakh units per year. At present, the company is investing a similar amount of Rs 1,700 crore to increase the capacity at its Manesar plant by 2.5 lakh units that will be operational by 2012. "The third plant at Manesar is likely to have almost the same investment and capacity like the second one," a source said at the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) summit here today. When contacted a Maruti official declined to comment saying that the company is currently focusing on the second plant. Maruti Suzuki India's Manesar plant has annual production capacity of three lakh units, while the Gurgaon plant produces seven lakh units per annum. Recently the company's Managing Director and CEO Shinzo Nakanishi had stated that the Indian car market is likely to double to five million units by 2015 and the company needs to be prepared to meet the growing demand in order to maintain its leadership position. According to SIAM, the market leader sold 2,82,488 cars during the April-July period this, representing a 47.68 per cent share in the overall 5,92,405 units market. In the comparable year-ago period, MSI had a 53.13 per cent share in the 4,40,069 units car market, with sales of 2,33,811 units. However the company was hopeful to regain an over 50 per cent share of the domestic passenger car market by the end of this fiscal.
Fiat to export cars to neighbour countries by year-end
26 August 2010;hindustantimes.com:Fiat India on Thursday said it will start exporting cars to neighbouring markets -- Bhutan, Sri Lanka and Nepal -- by the end of 2010. The company, which has already started exporting its models Linea, Punto and Palio to South Africa, will look to enter the Bangladesh market by next year, an official of Fiat India Automobiles Ltd said on the sidelines of the SIAM summit in New Delhi. "We see opportunities in the neighbouring markets for our products, specially Sri Lanka, where the government has thrashed the import duty on new cars," the official said. Recently, the Sri Lanka government had brought down the import duty to 117 per cent from over 200 per cent earlier, the official said. Fiat has a joint venture with Tata Motors through which they share production facility at Ranjangaon in Maharashtra and distribution network as well.
Honda Cars undecided about vehicle assembly in Rajasthan
26 August 2010;timesofindia.indiatimes.com:NEW DELHI: Premium carmaker Honda Siel Cars India (HSCI) on Thursday said it is yet to decide on starting vehicle assembly in its second plant in Rajasthan, which has been put on hold indefinitely since last year. "We have not yet decided on the vehicle assembly...it will depend on the full capacity utilisation of our first plant in Greater Noida," HSCI Vice-President Jnaneshwar Sen told reporters at the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM) summit here. The company had announced an investment of Rs 1,000 crore in the Tapukara plant having an installed capacity of 60,000 units per annum. It has recently increased the investment by Rs 250 crore. "We will launch our new small car in the next year from the Greater Noida plant. Once the capacity is fully utilised, we will move to Rajasthan," Sen said. Greater Noida has a capacity to produce 1 lakh vehicles a year. Currently, it is utilising about 60 per cent of its full capacity. In April-July period, the company sales had declined to 16,925 units from 17,749 units in the year-ago period.
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