State-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corp. (ONGC) has sought pricing and marketing freedom to help bring to production a one-trillion cubic feet gas discovery that will open up a new sedimentary basin after over three decades.
ONGC, which has opened for commercial production six out of India’s seven producing basins, has made a significant natural gas discovery in the Gulf of Kutch of Gujarat coast that can produce about three million standard cubic meters per day, a senior company official said.
This will open up the country’s eighth sedimentary basin — the first in over three decades — for oil and gas production in two years.
“We can bring to production the find in 2—3 years time,” he said. “The present government-mandated gas price of $2.48 per million British thermal unit does not make the discovery commercially viable. Since the find is in shallow waters, it does not qualify to get the $5.56 per mmBtu cap price set for difficult fields,” the official said. The current rates of gas are uneconomic, he added.