The Hindu Business Line : ONGC to join hands with Uranium Corp for exploration

Lunej (Gujarat), Oct 6 With the Indo-US nuclear deal throwing open new vistas of nuclear power generation in the country, Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd (ONGC) would shortly sign a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with State-owned Uranium Corporation of India for exploration and mining of the fissile matter, the Union Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister, Mr Murli Deora, said here on Sunday.

“A number of companies have evinced interest in nuclear power generation in India. We are also working on it and planning mining of uranium,” he said when asked about reports in this regard.

He was here to mark the 50th anniversary of India’s first-ever oil and gas find at Lunej in the Cambay Basin off the Gulf of Cambay.

NEWER AVENUES

About the efforts to procure more crude from abroad, the Minister said ONGC is trying to explore new avenues in countries such as Venezuela, Columbia and others and increase its overseas production from the current eight million tonnes a year.

ONGC, which has seven onshore and offshore hydrocarbon fields in India, was active across 17 countries at present. India currently imports almost 80 per cent of its domestic crude requirement of 120 million tonnes annually.

“We are also trying to buy wells abroad in a big way, particularly in Russia, and working on a Rs 5,500-crore programme in the UK,” he told the gathering.

Praising Gujarat for its efforts in hydrocarbon sector, he said India’s largest hydrocarbon complex was being set up at Dahej where many local people would get employment. Mr Deora said ONGC was already going ahead in solar and other renewable energy resources and had commenced a 50 MW wind farm facility in Kutch district of Gujarat recently. Gujarat was being paid Rs 1,900 crore annually by way of royalty for the land ONGC was using in the State.

DUAL PRICING POLICY

Replying to questions, the Minister said the Government was considering a dual-pricing policy for supply of diesel envisaging ending subsidy on this fuel for use in all but a few key users such as railways, public transport and defence.

The Union Textile Minister, Mr Shankar Singh Vaghela, who was also present, urged ONGC, which pays 20 per cent royalty to the State Governments concerned, to also consider a 5-10 per cent of royalty to be paid from its revenues to the farmers whose land it was using for exploration and drilling purposes as these land suffer damages.

Also, ONGC should invest around Rs 100 crore annually on research and development in alternate sources of energy and provide infrastructure and basic facilities in the areas it was active in.

The Cambay Basin, spread over 425 sq km, is estimated to have 2,260 million tonnes of hydrocarbon deposits. It has a total 3,200 oil and gas wells, out of which the operational ones at present number 75, producing six million tonnes of crude and two billion cubic metres of gas.

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