India’s largest petroleum retailer Indian Oil Corporation plans to expand the reach of green fuel and charging infrastructure in major parts of Bengal to encourage motorists to convert to environment friendly options.

The company offers two variants of petrol and one of diesel which it claims improves the quality of emissions apart from enhancing the performance of the vehicle.

Sold at a premium to the regular variety of fuel, they are available only at some selected pumps. The effort to widen the reach is in line with IOC’s mission to hit net zero emission target by 2046 ahead of India’s commitment to hit the level in 2070.

There are about 1,482 retail outlets of IOC, which has 60 per cent of Bengal’s market share, and the company is hoping to equip at least 1,000 of them with a greener variety of fuel.

“We want to make these better varieties of petrol and diesel available to all motorists in the state,” L.K.S Chauhan, executive director and state head of IOC’s Bengal state office, said.

The company has declared 2023 as the year of the green resolve. The cleaner fuel in petrol and diesel has been branded as XP95 and XtraGreen, respectively.

While this variety of petrol is available in 600 outlets, the new diesel has been rolled out in 275 outlets.

Making the new fuel available requires reconfiguration of storage facilities at the retail outlet level, entailing space and investment. Such requirements could potentially leave out smaller pumps where space is a constraint.

Chauhan also informed that IOC will create charging stations for electric vehicles at petrol pumps. Manash Routray, general manager (retail sales) of WBSO, said there would be 300 EV charging stations by the end of the fiscal.

“It will at least double in the next fiscal,” he added. IOC said it was making progress in ethanol blending of petrol even though it lags national average.