The Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas S. Jaipal Reddy informed the Rajya Sabha in written reply today that the domestic availability of natural gas during June 2011 was around 120 MMSCMD while imported RLNG comprised 46 MMSCMD totalling 166 MMSCMD of domestic consumption. The availability of domestic natural gas during 2012-13 to 2014-15 is projected to be as follows :
(MMSCMD)
|
Source |
2012-13 |
2013-14 |
2014-15 |
|
Pre NELP /CBM |
13 |
17 |
24 |
|
KG-D6 |
28 |
24 |
20 |
|
ONGC |
55 |
55 |
58 |
|
OIL |
8 |
9 |
10 |
|
Total availability from domestic source |
104 |
105 |
113 |
As against this, the projected cumulative additional demand over and above the current consumption of 166 MMSCMD, during the 2012-13 to 2014-15, is as follows:-
(MMSCMD)
|
Year |
2012-13 |
2013-14 |
2014-15 |
|
|
Cumulative Additional Demand |
|
|
254.2 |
284.27 |
356.16 |
As the domestic gas availability is projected to decline in the next two to three years, the additional demand will have to be primarily met through imported LNG, he added.
The Minister further said that to acquire natural gas from external sources, India imports LNG through various entities such as Petronet LNG Ltd. (PLL), Shell Hazira LNG Pvt. Ltd. (HLPL), Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation (GSPC) and GAIL (India) Ltd.
India imports Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) on long term contract and medium/short term contracts as well as spot purchase basis. Currently, 7.5 MMTPA of LNG is imported on long term contract basis by PLL from RasGas, Qatar.
PLL has also tied up import of 1.4 MMTPA of LNG imports from Gorgon, Australia for its Kochi LNG terminal. GAIL has signed an agreement for importing 3.5 MMTPA of LNG from the Sabine Pass Terminal in USA. Beside long term contracts, GAIL and PLL have entered short term/medium term contracts of around 1.6 MMTPA for the next 3 years.
As regards procurement of LNG on spot purchase basis, India’s gas companies in the recent years have sourced LNG from countries such as Oman, Trinidad & Tobago, Malaysia, Nigeria, Australia, Egypt, U.A.E, Russian Federation, Equatorial Guinea, U.S.A, Algeria, Yemen and Norway.
Reddy also said that the present state of the proposed Iran-Pakistan-India Gas pipeline is that several rounds of discussions have taken place between India, Pakistan and Iran. However, several critical issues such as the project structure, certification of the gas source by an independent agency, delivery point of Iranian gas, guarantees related to the safety of the pipeline and security of supply, transit fee, seat of dispute redressal/arbitration proceedings besides contractual issues, including the pricing of gas, are yet to be resolved.