Backing the spirit of innovation, 10 public sector undertakings under the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas, including the IOCL, ONGC, EIL, OIL, NRL, BPCL, HPCL, GAIL and MRPL, have created a corpus of Rs. 320 crore to support start-up initiatives.

Since the launch of the scheme by the PSUs, there has been a constant flow of applications and some extremely innovative ideas have come through. The Start- up ideas have been received from a varying age group (from a fresh engineering graduate to a 70-year-old entrepreneur) from across the country.

The 10 oil PSUs have together selected nearly 30 start-up projects for support in the first round of the scheme. Some of the many innovative projects that have made it after rigorous evaluation include:

•         Electronic leak detector for detecting body and bung leak of LPG cylinders

•         Self - sustaining low-maintenances toilets, or eco-toilets

•         Multiuse Fuel from Agricultural Waste Biomass

•         Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROVs) for underwater inspections

•         Converting waste plastics to high value petroleum fuels

•         Solar Stove- Revolutionary Day and Night Indoor Solar Cooktop System for all lifestyles

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