In November 2015, Water. Desalination + reuse (Faversham House) reported that Indian Oil was building a reverse osmosis plant at its Gujarat refinery. The investment amounted to Rs 160 crore (US$24.1 million). The unit was designed to recover treated wastewater from the refinery, which had an annual throughput of 13.7 million tonnes, and so lower its demand for freshwater. Completion was scheduled for March 2016. According to refinery management, discharge volumes were also to be cut as far as possible.
The report showed that Indian refineries were using reverse osmosis not only for desalination but also to reuse their own effluent and save scarce freshwater.