On Friday, Hardeep Singh Puri, Petroleum Minister, stated that with a perspective to increase domestic output and stop reliance on imported fuel, India will double the area that is beneath exploration and production of oil and gas to 0.5 million sq km by 2025 and by 2030, 1 million sq km.
At the World Energy Policy Summit 2022, he declared that to reach its growing energy needs in the predictable future, the world’s third-largest energy consumer would continue to depend on hydrocarbons.
Since the domestic production is insufficient, currently, India depends on imports to reach 85 percent of its oil needs and 50 percent of the natural gas necessity.
In the last five years, seven rounds of a bargain of acreage under the new Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP) have doubled the area under exploration for oil and gas to 0.2 million sq km.
He added that the Indian economy, widening from the current SD 3 trillion to USD 5 trillion by 2025 and in 2030 USD 10 trillion, would lead to a rapid increase in energy demand.
Mentioning India’s target to meet net-zero carbon emissions by 2027, he stated that the government has taken necessary measures to improve the hydrocarbon policy framework to assure energy security for the country while chasing the green path to progress.
He also declared that they admit that gas and oil will continue to reach the baseload of their energy demand for the predictable future.
Coal, oil, and solid biomass are the three fuels that are used to meet 80 percent of India’s energy requirements. Coal makes up 44 percent of all energy consumption while oil for a quarter and the portion of natural gas is 6 percent.
Puri stated that by 2030 they are increasing the portion of natural gas from the current 6 percent to 15 percent to swiftly utilize this gas in the energy mix.
Ethanol extracted from sugarcane and surplus foodgrains are being injected into petrol to reduce the dependence on imported oil.
Puri mentioned that through a series of continuous reforms, ethanol mixing has reached a national average of over 8 percent mixing currently and is all positioned to increase to 20 percent by 2025
Their target is on the faster utilization of green hydrogen and to establish India as a core of green hydrogen. The oil and gas companies are establishing projects for use of hydrogen as fuel and also the addition of hydrogen in gas pipelines.
The improvement across the value chain of the oil and gas sector in India is a result of a long-term strategy to use huge resources.
According to Puri, India will appear as a global leader for a sustainable transition to cleaner and greener energy.
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