Amidst the COVID-19 pandemic worst situation, the Government of India is exploring the feasibility of converting existing nitrogen plants to produce oxygen, to fulfill the requirement of medical oxygen. In view of this, PM holds a meeting and reviews the progress of converting nitrogen plants into oxygen plants.

In the meeting, the process of converting the existing Pressure Swing Absorption (PSA) nitrogen plants for the production of oxygen was discussed. In nitrogen plants, Carbon Molecular Sieve (CMS) is used whereas Zeolite Molecular Sieve (ZMS) is required for producing oxygen. Therefore, by replacing CMS with ZMS and carrying out few other changes such as oxygen analyzer, control panel system, flow valves, etc. existing nitrogen plants can be modified to produce oxygen.

 So far 14 industries have been identified where the conversion of plants is under progress, and, Further 37 Nitrogen plants have been also identified with the help of industry associations.

Recently, the Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay (IIT-B) set up a demonstration unit to convert nitrogen generators, into oxygen generators by fine-tuning the existing nitrogen plant set up.