NEW DELHI: In a move to provide national highways and major transport corridors with eco-friendly fuel, Union Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas Jitin Prasada has announced that two new CNG Green Corridors will come into operation soon between Lucknow and Delhi.

The creation of this facility along the two corridors would allow commuters between Delhi and Lucknow to move about in their CNG-equipped vehicles without any worry of refilling their tanks as natural gas would be made available all along these routes. While one of the corridors will pass through Unnao, Kanpur, Auraiya, Agra and Mathura, the other will run on the Shahajahanpur-Bareli-Moradabad-Ghaziabad route. CNG fuel availability is being ensured in Lucknow, Kanpur, Agra, Mathura and Delhi, and work will soon start for setting up CNG refilling stations in Unnao and Auraiya. Refilling facility is being made available in Bareli, Moradabad and Ghaziabad also.

Mr. Prasada said the Gas Authority of India Limited (GAIL) is working on setting up CNG stations every 100 km. “The Central Government will extend all help to make both these routes operational in the next two years,'' Mr. Prasada said. He said vehicle owners of CNG would now get at least one gas station within every 100-150 km on both highways. The Government has also set up Green Gas Ltd (GGL), a joint venture of GAIL and Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), for implementation of city gas projects for supply of piped natural gas (PNG) to domestic, commercial and industrial consumers and compressed natural gas (CNG) to automobile consumers in Lucknow and Agra.

“We plan to supply piped natural gas to 5,000 homes in Lucknow in the next one year and 70,000 homes in the next five years. We are also going to increase the number of CNG stations to 80 in the next five years from the present 40. For this, we will expand the pipelines from 1,100 km at present by another 600 km,'' he added. Mr. Prasada said the Petroleum Ministry also proposes to introduce within the next two months multi-functional digital regulators to show the exact quantity of gas left in a cylinder.

It is also planning to launch a vehicle-monitoring system to track petrol and diesel tankers. This system would help keep a watch on the movement of the vehicles and detect any suspicious deviation from the defined route.