REUTERS, New Delhi

India’s imports of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) from the US are set to top 1 million metric tons in June, a record high, industry sources said, as New Delhi turned to costlier suppliers to offset disruption from the Middle East.

Before the US-Israeli war on Iran and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, India depended on Middle Eastern producers for 90 percent of its LPG imports, which totalled about 2 million tons per month.

Imports of LPG, widely used as cooking fuel in Indian households, declined to as low as 696,000 tons in April because of the strait blockade, government data showed.

The imports, however, recovered to 1.15 million tons in May, the data showed.

Before the disruption, New Delhi had planned to raise US LPG purchases to about 10 percent of total imports as part of its effort to rebalance trade with Washington.

The closure of the waterway accelerated spot buying from the US, with Indian refiners purchasing unprecedented volumes at hefty spot market premiums as the government’s priority was to maintain uninterrupted cooking gas supplies, said a trade source who is aware of the purchases.

The sources declined to be named publicly as they are not authorised to speak to the media. India also asked refiners to maximise LPG output, prioritised LPG sales to households and accelerated the rollout of piped gas connections. The efforts have already started to reduce India’s LPG consumption by 15 percent to 20 percent, one of the sources said.

India is on track to receive about 1.1 million to 1.2 million tons of US LPG in June, while supplies from the United Arab Emirates have started to recover to around 300,000 to 400,000 tons this month, two sources at Indian refiners said.