India’s refining and energy sector will have to balance growing energy demand and energy security with the transition towards net-zero emissions, industry leaders said at a panel discussion at the The Hindu Sustainability Summit 2026 in Chennai.
At a discussion on the topic of ‘Fossils to Net Zero: Transforming India’s Refinery and Energy Landscape’, S.G. Venkatesh, Director (Technical), Chennai Petroleum Corporation Limited (CPCL); Nandakumar Velayudhan Pillai, Director (Refinery), Mangalore Refinery & Petrochemicals Limited (MRPL); Santosh K. Singh, Chief Sustainability Officer, Larsen & Toubro; and D. Senthil Kumar, Managing Director, Tamil Nadu Petroproducts Limited, spoke about the challenges facing the sector. The session was moderated by Srinivasan Ramani, Deputy National Editor, The Hindu .
The company had also improved its energy efficiency benchmark and was targeting net-zero Scope 1 and Scope 2 emissions by 2046.
He said the CPCL had reduced its energy consumption even as it achieved its highest-ever crude throughput through energy conservation measures, use of cleaner fuels, operational optimisation, and digitalisation.
The summit is supported by Chennai Petroleum Corporation Limited (CPCL) as the Presenting Partner, with NLC India Limited, Larsen & Toubro (L&T), Navin’s, WABAG, Tamil Nadu Newsprint and Papers Limited, Indian Bank, Urbando and State Bank of India as Associate Partners. The summit’s sustainability-focused partnerships include Thermax as the Sustainable Cooling Partner, Treeni as the Sustainability Intelligence Partner, Chennai Port Authority as the Blue Economy Partner and Tamil Nadu Green Climate Company as the Climate Action Partner.
He said similar mechanisms were already in place in other industries under the Bureau of Energy Efficiency, including through the Perform, Achieve and Trade scheme. With the carbon market now being expanded to more industries, including refineries and petrochemicals, trading activity could increase significantly, he said. “The trading activities are expected to be very challenging in the future,” he said, adding that the incentives available to industries that perform better than their targets could create greater scope for investment in energy efficiency.
However, the earlier mechanism had not gained sufficient traction.
