A consortium led by the State-promoted Gujarat State Petronet Ltd (GSPL), a subsidiary of the GSPC Ltd, plans to invest nearly Rs 12,000 crore over the next three years.

The investment is to create three cross-country natural gas transmission pipeline totalling around 4,000-km in length.

A joint venture agreement (JVA) was signed here on Monday by GSPL, holding a majority stake of 52 per cent, with three central PSU partners Indian Oil Corporation Ltd (26 per cent), Bharat Petroleum Corporation Ltd and Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (11 per cent each), official sources told Business Line here. As majority partner, GSPL would invest nearly Rs 6,500 crore on the prestigious grid it would be laying outside Gujarat for the first time. GSPL, a listed company, also informed the bourses accordingly.

At present, it has a nearly 2,000 km-long gas grid crisscrossing Gujarat, and expanding to another 200 km, and transmits 35 million metric standard cubic metres per day (mmscmd) of natural gas.

Hydrocarbon regulator Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board (PNGRB) had awarded the Letter of Authorisation to the four consortium partners on July 7, 2011, to develop the three pipeline projects.

The ambitious projects are the Mallavaram-Bhilwara pipeline (1,585 km), Mehsana-Bhatinda pipeline (1,670 km) and Bhatinda-Jammu-Srinagar pipeline (740 km). The consortium is expected to invest nearly Rs 3 crore per km on laying the pipelines which will together be 3,995 km long.

Initially, the Gujarat-to-Jammu & Kashmir pipeline is expected to carry 20 mmscmd of gas which would be gradually increased to 40 mmscmd.

GSPL is the country’s first company to purely transport natural gas on open access basis.

In January 2006, it had mopped up nearly Rs 375 crore through an IPO to part-fund its Rs 1,450 crore expansion plans.

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