Petronet LNG is seeking an extra 2-3 million tonne (MT) of liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the world’s top exporter Qatar, Petronet’s chief executive AK Balyan said on Saturday. “We are in negotiations for a long term contract... We are talking to Qatar for additional 2-3 MT a year,” Balyan told reporters on the sidelines of the Asia Gas Partnership Summit.
India is already the world’s eighth-largest importer of LNG and the market for imported natural gas in the country is set to quadruple in value to nearly $15 billion in a couple of years due to a huge surge in investments on facilities meant to process the fuel.
Petronet now receives 7.5 MT a year of LNG from Qatar’s Rasgas under a long term deal at its 10 MT a year regassification terminal at Dahej in Gujarat. It will also buy 1.5 MT of LNG a year from Australia’s Gorgon project from 2014, to be processed at its 5 MT a year terminal at Kochi in southern India, which is expected to start operations in October-December 2012. Balyan said additional gas could be received at any of the two terminals. Petronet is also exploring the viability of a third plant in eastern India and will consider acquiring stake in overseas LNG projects in Russia and Africa.
“We have definite proposals to look at equity participation and access to resources, We are looking at them and it will take us a few months…We do not have expertise in exploration so it will be a consortium approach in tie-up with other Indian companies,” Balyan said. Petronet has submitted a bid with ONGC and GAIL (India) for a minority stake in Russia’s Yamal LNG project, which is set to start production of up to 16 million tonne of LNG a year in 2016.
Source: Indian Express