AG&P aims for its first LNG terminal in India by 2024 end
Singapore-based Atlantic, Gulf and Pacific is looking to set up its first liquefied natural gas terminal in India by 2024 end, a top company official said, although it is evaluating other sites as an alternative to the terminal’s location in the south of the country. “AG&P is very bullish on an India import terminal and our aim is to have a terminal up and running in the next two years,” Karthik Sathyamoorthy, president of LNG Terminals and Logistics division at AG&P, told Reuters. The company broke ground on its first LNG import facility in India, at the Karaikal port in the southern city of Puducherry, in February 2020. But then COVID-related curbs led to a slowdown in the terminal’s development, said Sathyamoorthy. “Today we have restarted focus on the import terminal… But in addition to Karaikal we have a couple of other options as well,” he said. “We are looking at a terminal in India but it doesn’t need to be in Karaikal per se.”
G7 price cap on Russian oil won’t impact India; green hydrogen policy soon, says Hardeep Singh Puri
The European Union (EU) and Group of Seven (G7) nations decided to cap the price of Russian seaborne crude oil at $60 per barrel as of December 5. However, the decision is unlikely to impact India, as its exposure to Russian crude oil is minimal, Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas Hardeep Singh Puri has said. “Russia is not our top supplier of oil; our traditional top suppliers are Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE,” Puri told BQPrime. In FY22, India imported 53 percent of its oil from these countries. In FY23, between April and September, 52 percent of India’s crude oil imports came from these countries, he added. Impact of G7 Russian oil price cap Even though the oil minister remained optimistic about India, he said if Russia refuses to sell crude oil at the capped price or cuts down production, it will affect the global supply chain. It will put pressure on producing countries to meet the energy demand, resulting in a spike in crude prices. Russia exports close to 4.5 million barrels of oil per day, which is roughly five percent of global production. “We have a situation where two major producers—Iran and Russia—are under some form of sanctions and one major consumer, China, is under lockdown,” Puri said, adding, ”the producers, OPEC+, have decided to cut supplies in their last meeting, so the markets are in a state of flux.”