Why Rubio is visiting Reliance’s oil refinery in India, the world’s largest

Reliance is central to Washington’s efforts to punish Russian energy buyers and contain oil prices amid the war on Iran with a crucial midterm election looming. Save Share New Delhi, India —United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio has arrived in India for a two-day visit, during which he is set to tour the Jamnagar refinery complex in Gujarat, owned by billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries, a major player in global oil markets. Reliance’s crude refinery in Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s home state is the world’s largest single-site refinery. In many ways, Reliance Industries’ businesses sit at the crossroads of the ongoing global energy crisis. The conglomerate is central to Washington’s efforts to punish Russian energy buyers, while also trying to contain oil prices amid the war on Iran, on top of rising diesel costs in the US, where a crucial midterm election looms. Reliance has also only recently committed to a major investment in the US, which President Donald Trump’s administration has cited as an example of its successes in luring global capital. Rubio is skipping the capital, New Delhi, at a time when the US-India bilateral relationship has been rocky, strained by a string of friction points — and an elusive trade deal. So why is the top US diplomat visiting the world’s largest single-site oil refinery? After meetings in Mumbai, India’s financial hub in the western state of Maharashtra, Rubio will fly to Jamnagar in neighbouring Gujarat, near the Gulf of Kutch. Jamnagar opens into the Arabian Sea and is home to Reliance Industries’ refining complex, a major hub for crude processing and fuel exports, which processes 1.4 million barrels per day (bpd). Rubio had visited India earlier this year too, but this trip “is a little more business-focused”, the US ambassador to India, Sergio Gor, told reporters last week. A readout from Rubio’s office noted that he would “meet with business leaders to promote opportunities for commercial investment and economic cooperation”. “[At Jamnagar] he will meet some of the folks at Reliance,” Gor said. The world’s largest single-site oil-refining complex has a combined crude-processing capacity of 1.4 million bpd. That is nearly 1.5 percent of global refining capacity, according to the company....