The Delhi high court (HC) division Bench on Thursday sought a response from Reliance Industries (RIL) and others regarding the government's appeal against the Mukesh Ambani-owned conglomerate and others for fraudulently and unjustly enriching themselves by draining gas from their deposits, amounting to over $1.5 billion. The Centre had appealed against the single-judge Bench order of the Delhi HC on May 9, which had dismissed its petition. Justice Anup Jairam Bhambhani had upheld the international arbitration award of July 24, 2018, in favour of the RIL-led consortium. The consortium includes UK-based BP Plc and Niko Resources of Canada.
The bank guarantee, which will be equivalent to the incremental revenue that RIL will get from the new gas price, will be encashed if it is proved that the company hoarded gas or deliberately suppressed production at the main D1&D3 fields in the eastern offshore KG-D6 block since 2010-11.
The International Finance Corporation is the private sector arm of the World Bank GSPC Gas, which is in the business of distributing natural gas to households and vehicles in Gujarat, has lined up an initial investment of $140 million for laying new pipelines for gas and building the infrastructure needed for gas distribution in cities. It may use the IFC fund to partly finance this expenditure.
The petroleum ministry has put on back burner the proposal to create a national gas highway development authority, following an opposition from the Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board, which currently has the powers to authorise pipelines.
Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan was to give away the awards but he could not attend because he was travelling.
While most analysts are expecting poor results from oil marketing companies (OMCs) in the first quarter of 2024-25 (Q1FY25) and even in the first half (H1) of FY25, GAIL (India) could be an outlier. Upstream producers, Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) and Oil India (OIL) could do well due to strong crude and gas prices, but refiners are likely to see weak margins and the impact of frozen prices during the election period will also be negative.
It added this wasn't aimed at benefiting Reliance Industries Ltd alone.
Launching a major global initiative for attracting foreign investment in the hydrocarbon sector, India on Monday held a roadshow in London for auctioning 55 oil and gas exploration blocks.
Modi govt is committed to extend the piped gas networks in the country to 30,000 kms in the next 15 years as against the 15,000 kms network today
Gor underlined that President Trump has a "deep friendship" with Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and that is something that is unique.
The asset it owned by Venugopal Dhoot and a US oil and gas explorer.
Tata Projects (Hyderabad), Tractebel Engineers and Constructors Pvt Ltd (New Delhi), Germanischer Lloyd Industrial Services (Mumbai) and Bureau Veritas (India), Pvt Ltd (Mumbai) are among the 13 agencies which will perform technical audit of city gas projects.
Gail India subsidiary Mahanagar Gas (MGL) on Friday announced a steep reduction in the retail price of compressed natural gas (CNG) by Rs 8/kg and domestic PNG (piped natural gas) by Rs 5/SCM across its licenced area. The move comes on the heels of the Centre revising the pricing methodology of domestically-produced natural gas on Thursday as proposed by the Kirit Parikh committee and following it with the new price announcement earlier in the day. In February, the city gas distributor reduced its CNG price by Rs 2.5/kg but prices are still around 80 per cent more than those in April last.
Union Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas Suresh Gopi has stirred controversy by suggesting that members of the "upper castes" should handle the tribal affairs portfolio. Gopi, an actor-turned-politician, argued that true progress in tribal welfare would only be achieved under the leadership of individuals from "upper castes." His comments have been met with widespread criticism, including from CPI state secretary Benoy Viswam and prominent tribal leader C K Janu.
India is preoccupied with analysing the US sanctions, which may cut off India's access to discounted Russian crude and force it to buy at market prices.
The government on Monday scrapped 30-month old windfall profit tax on domestically-produced crude oil and on export of jet fuel (ATF), diesel and petrol following a decline in international oil prices. Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary tabled a notification in Rajya Sabha scrapping the levy on crude oil produced by firms like state-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) and exports of fuels done by companies like Reliance Industries Ltd.
Government has no role in fixing prices of natural gas produced from areas auctioned under NELP and only approves the pricing formula, petroleum ministry has told a committee of Secretaries appointed to look into the vexed issue.
Reason behind for the change in his stance: gas price increase.
Projects worth over $20 billion, ranging from the decade-long Iran-Pakistan-India gas pipeline to various oil and gas exploration and production projects, are being re-considered, said officials in the Union Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas.
"India offers attractive opportunities for foreign investors in petroleum sector under the seventh round of the New Exploration Licensing Policy," Minister of State for Petroleum and Natural Gas Dinsha Patel said on Thursday, while inaugurating a Road Show in Calgary .
The government will allow exploration firm Oil and Natural Gas Corporation and Gas Authority of India to market domestic LPG to increase penetration of cooking fuel to 75 per cent of the population.
The government is giving top priority to making available 581 MMSCMD of gas required by power projects in the country, Rajya Sabha was informed on Tuesday.
India will step up efforts to find new oil and gas fields as the country's largest oil producer Oil and Natural Gas Corporation expects output from its existing fields to drop sharply in next few years.
Vedanta's Cairn Oil & Gas on Thursday announced the appointment of Nick Walker as the new chief executive officer (CEO) of the company. In a statement, the company said the appointment is effective January 5. "Before this appointment, Walker was president and chief executive officer at Lundin Energy, one of the leading European independent E&P companies," it said.
The government may consider a public-private partnership (PPP) mode for setting up national gas highways to ensure distribution across the country.
ONGC Videsh (OVL), a wholly owned subsidiary of Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC), is eyeing more gas fields in Libya.
Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar will visit Dhaka and Yangon in January to explore the possibility of laying a natural gas pipeline from Myanmar to India via Bangladesh.
Eight companies are in the fray for rolling out gas networks in six cities, bids for which were invited by the Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board. The deadline for submission of the bids expired on Tuesday.
IndianOil Corp Ltd, for instance, saw a growth of around 22 per cent in volumes and nearly two per cent in its market share. It traded nearly 10,517 million tonnes (mt) of auto gas in December against 8,593 mt of auto gas in September.
India is the third largest consumer of petroleum products, after the US and China.
Close on the heels of initiating a dialogue with Iran and Myanmar on importing gas through onland pipelines, Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar will soon visit Turkmenistan and Afghanistan to explore the possibility of bringing natural gas from Ce
OVL, along with global oil majors such as Royal Dutch Shell, ExxonMobil, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, British Petroleum, Total and China National Petroleum Corporation, is one of the 35 companies short-listed by the Iraqi government for the auction, which includes six oil-producing blocks with recoverable reserves of 40 billion barrels of oil, making it the largest such auction in the world.
Earlier this week, the ministry had come out with a clarification, saying domestic gas producers had to stick to the earlier price of $4.2 a unit until a further notification from the new government.
Modi said the push towards a gas-based economy where the share of environment-friendly fuel in the energy basket will be increased from 6.2 per cent to 15 per cent by 2030, will create lakhs of jobs and help meet India's COP-21 commitment of cutting emission intensity by 33-35 per cent.
Ras Laffan Liquefied Natural Gas Co Ltd (RasGas) of Qatar has pulled out of state-run National Thermal Power Corporation's tender for supply of 3 million tonnes of LNG for its power plants.
The Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council, scheduled to meet on June 22, could take a call on ending uncertainty on taxing foreign airlines and shippers as regards certain services, a senior official in the know told Business Standard. He said the Council was expected to decide on exempting the services in question from GST - aircraft lease rentals, maintenance, crew salaries, etc. These services are provided by foreign airlines to their Indian operations.
India will begin importing gas in the form of liquefied natural gas from early 2004 to augment deficit in domestic production, Petroleum Minister Ram Naik said.
