The government is considering establishing 30 days of strategic reserves for liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), indicating that building such storage facilities (an initiative that had previously been overlooked) is no longer an option in light of supply disruptions caused by the West Asia crisis.
According to sources, the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas and oil marketing companies (OMCs) are considering the construction of caverns for storing LPG, similar to two caverns with a combined capacity of 1.4 lakh tonnes, which can cover nearly 1.5 days of the country's demand. India consumes around 80,000 tonnes of LPG every day.

"OMCs have been working on ideas for new caverns or LPG storage sites for quite some time. The ongoing war has had a significant impact on India's imports. As a result, they are now aggressively pursuing this as a medium- to long-term strategy for discovering potential sites and constructing storage in caverns such as Mangalore and Visakhapatnam," said one of the insiders.
The issue was also apparently discussed at the Prime Minister's Office (PMO). The insider stated that storage for crude oil and LPG is now a top concern.India has two caverns to store the important commodity, which is the primary cooking medium for over 33 crore people. The state-run Hindustan Petroleum Corporation (HPCL) operates an 80,000-tonne underground LPG rock cavern in Mangalore. Similarly, South Asia LPG, a joint venture of HPCL and TotalEnergies Marketing Holdings India, operates a 60,000-tonne cavern in Visakhapatnam.
Small countries like Japan and South Korea, which rely heavily on imports for energy, already have massive strategic/commercial storages for crude oil, LNG, and LPG totalling approximately 250 days and 200 days, respectively, with a minimum of 50-60 days storage for the primary cooking and heating medium.

Globally, there are about 80 LPG storage caves. Underground caves are one of the safest ways to store the commodities. LPG, which is a pressurised propane-butane mixture, necessitates the use of expensive high-pressure or cryogenic equipment.
A top official stated that the need for extra storage is becoming more important as a result of the "current crisis".
"The government's goal now, more than ever, is to create storage facilities. The current hostilities have made it evident that large consuming nations must have storage facilities. This is important not only for energy security, but also for some degree of strategic autonomy in dealing with the regular weaponisation of such resources," the official explained.

India imports 60 percent of its primary cooking fuel requirements. India consumed more than 33 million tonnes (mt) of LPG in FY25, with around 20.67 mt imported. Approximately 90% of this is imported from West Asia via the SoH.