Assam CM urges petrol cos to bail out tea gardens
Chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal has urged all petroleum companies to raise their production of natural gas to bail out nearly 1.5 lakh big and small tea gardens which have been crippled by short supply of gas, which fuels the tea-making factories. Tea and petroleum together form the state’s industrial backbone. The two industries are largely concentrated in upper Assam areas, which is BJP’s new-found electoral bastion. The tea industry has been the sole source of income for several lakh adivasis of Chotanagpur origin for over two centuries now. The adivasis were brought by the British as workers in tea gardens. These tea gardens depend on natural gas as an economical source of energy for running the factories, instead of electricity which is costlier. Read More: ? Petroleum consumption to grow by 6 per cent in India: Moody’s Sonowal said, “ONGC, OIL and GAIL must take immediate steps for ensuring adequate supply of gas to the tea gardens. Around 10 lakh people spread across 1.5 lakh big and small tea gardens are dependent on the tea industry. As the present period is the peak season for tea production in Assam, continued shortage in supply of gas will adversely affect the state economy as well.” Sonowal, accompanied by state industry minister Chandra Mohan Patowary and BJP MPs and MLAs from upper Assam, met additional secretary of petroleum ministry and top officials of ONGC, OIL and GAIL in New Delhi on Tuesday. “All the petroleum companies have been urged to raise their production and their full cooperation has been sought for augmenting tea and other industries in Assam. They are to find out the causes of leakages in gas supply chain and take steps for optimum utilization,” he said. Jonathan Quick Jersey
Petroleum ministry cautions against unauthorized advertisements for Government schemes
The Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MPNG) has today issued a caution that an entity with the name `Ujjwala RGGLV Yojana’ is claiming its appointment for LPG distributorship under Rajiv Gandhi Gramin LPG Yojana. The entity in question has issued an advertisement (sample copy enclosed) in a newspaper, according to the statement released by MPNG. The petroleum ministry has clarified that the entity in question is not authorized by the Ministry to appoint LPG distributorship, and has no role in PM Ujjwala Yojana either, added the ministry release. Demar Dotson Authentic Jersey
Govt. exploring opportunities to set up nuclear power plants in U’khand, Punjab and Haryana, says Dr Jitendra Singh
The government is exploring possibilities of establishing nuclear power plants in northern states of Uttarakhand, Punjab and Haryana, union Minister for Atomic Energy, Dr Jitendra Singh said at an ASSOCHAM event. “The present government can stake claim of having set up an atomic energy plant in Gorakhpur in Haryana, so we have brought atomic energy northwards which it had been waiting for 60-70 years and we made it to cross through Delhi because atomic energy never had the opportunity to see the capital of this country,” said Dr Singh while inaugurating an ASSOCHAM conference on nuclear power in India. He said that atomic energy remained confined only to Maharashtra, the western coast, Tamil Nadu, parts of Andhra Pradesh. So now we are exploring the possibilities of having such establishments in other possible places for example, near Dehradun in Uttarakhand, in Punjab near Patiala and in Bhiwandi in Haryana are being explored as venues for atomic plants. Highlighting the cost-effective aspect of nuclear energy, he said “The nuclear power plant being set up in Haryana will become operational by about next year at the cost of just Rs. six per unit.” “Atomic energy had remained confined to certain parts of the country, in Tarapur for obvious reasons because Dr Bhabha had set up his first establishment in Mumbai then we had south but we hardly had any presence in north India,” he said. He also said that the government had diversified nuclear energy and got it into a huge way in academics through Bhabha National Institute. “The Bhabha National Institute has got into an understanding with Tata Atomic Institute in Mumbai and we are now helping it to award degrees in cancer,” said the Minister. He also said that within a period of next ten years India will have at least 25 percent source of energy from nuclear sector. “That is going to be a remarkable achievement because energy needs of the country are growing very fast and it is going to be cost-effective.” “The challenge would be to how best to put it (nuclear energy) to use,” said Dr Singh. He also said that the government was using space technology to safeguard the thorium which will come to be utilized very soon in the years to come when India will have new sets of nuclear reactors. “While we will have this advantage of being the part of the Department of Atomic Energy which was perhaps not so visible earlier, we will also have the challenge and responsibility about how best to use this increasing availability of energy with wider application and how to safeguard the pilferage of the energy as well as the energy source by way of pilferage,” said the minister. He also said that Dr Homi J. Bhabha had a vision to establish a nuclear centre and also to declare to the world that it would be devoted to the peaceful purposes at a time when peaceful purposes of nuclear energy were hardly known and it was only known as a creator of atomic bomb. Keenan Allen Womens Jersey
Electricity dept faces Rs 9 crore losses every month due to line loss in Bijnor
With an increase in technical glitches and theft of electricity, line loss in Bijnor district is on the rise. While at this time of the year, the line loss was only 16% in 2015, it has crossed 23% this year. According to sources in the electricity department, the department is facing about Rs 9 crore in losses every month. Keeping this in mind, the electricity department has planned to set up camps in the district wherein a target of getting 14,000 new connections in three months has been given. According to data with the superintendent engineer’s office, there are 4.18 lakh consumers in Bijnor district, of which 3.31 lakh are for domestic use, 36,428 commercial and 43,966 connections are for tubewells, while according to the DPRO’s office, there are a total of 7.5 lakh families in the district. About 50% of the families have no legal electricity connection. Superintendent engineer of the corporation, Ranjeet Singh, said, “Most of the losses are in rural areas as those consumers pay a fixed bill while they spend a lot of electricity. However, now we are setting up meters in rural areas also. There is also power theft. We have launched a checking campaign to put an end to this. Thousands of FIR have been filled against the people for stealing power. Technical faults also cause line losses.” On the increasing line losses, Singh said, “Earlier the average power supply every month was about 110 million units while this year average per month is 140 million units. It is a fact that when power supply increases, line losses also go up.” “To lessen the losses, we have started a campaign to provide connection to those who do not have it. The corporation had assigned a target of 41,587 connections in the district within three months. So far we have given about 4,000.” Jean-Gabriel Pageau Jersey
ONGC stake sale: Subsidy burden gone, Centre eyes disinvestment
The government is understood to be re-evaluating the sale of a 5% stake in ONGC now that the oil and gas explorer will not bear any part of the subsidy burden arising out of under-recoveries from the sale of fuels. Officials privy to the developments told FE the sale could take place as soon as “the third quarter of the current financial year”. The disinvestment already has the approval of the Cabinet. At current prices, the stake sale could fetch the government in excess of Rs. 110 billion. On Monday, the ONGC stock lost 3.84% to close at R250.50 on the BSE. The Sensex fell 373.94 points to close at 28,294. 28. Between April and now, the ONGC stock has rallied 21% against a 13% gain clocked by the benchmark gauge. Should the sale go through, the government’s shareholding in the upstream oil company would fall to 63.93% from the current 68.93% and it will have moved closer to its FY17 disinvestment target of raising Rs. 565 billion. While Rs. 360 billion is sought be mopped up through stake sales in public sector undertakings, another Rs. 205 billion is to be raised from strategic disinvestment. The Maharatna has been on the government’s disinvestment radar for some time now. In late 2014, roadshows were held in some cities overseas but the proposed issue did not receive an enthusiastic response from investors who were concerned about the quantum of subsidy to be borne by the company. This time around too the government is treading carefully, not wishing to miss the disinvestment target yet again. The government has so far raised Rs. 31.83 billion in 2016-17 via disinvestments in NHPC and the sale of shares in Indian Oil and NTPC to their employees. The department of investment and public asset management will be looking to come up with at least one big-ticket offer for sale or IPO although a slew of buybacks is expected to bring in a chunk of non-debt capital receipts of an estimated Rs. 130 billion. More than a dozen companies have been asked to buy back shares to the extent they can by an amount equivalent to 25% of the aggregate of their fully paid-up share capital and free reserves. At the end of March 2015, CPSEs had surplus cash of about Rs. 2550 billion. Allen Bailey Jersey
Rahul Deep Singh appointed Hazira LNG MD
The Hazira Group of Companies, on Tuesday, announced the appointment of Rahul Deep Singh as Managing Director of Hazira LNG Pvt Ltd (HLPL) and Hazira Ports Pvt Ltd (HPPL). Nitin Shukla, MD and CEO of HLPL and HPPL, will superannuate on September 30 after 15 years of service in the Hazira Group of companies. In a statement here, Shukla said that since the commissioning of Hazira LNG in 2005, the terminal has rapidly expanded from an initial regasification capacity of 2 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) to 3 mtpa in 2008 and then further to 5 mtpa in 2013. Singh said LNG imports now account for about 45 per cent of the country’s gas demand. Hazira is a partnership between Shell Gas B.V and Total Gaz Electricité Holdings France. Both the shareholders represent two of the largest private LNG suppliers in the world. Shell and Total have a shareholding of 74 per cent and 26 per cent, respectively in each of the companies that comprise the Hazira LNG Terminal and Port project and are collectively known as Hazira Group of Companies (HGC). Wayne Simmonds Authentic Jersey
ONGC board vertically split on claiming gas compensation
The Board of ONGC is split on the issue of claiming compensation for Rs 110 billion worth of natural gas spewing from its KG basin block into adjoining fields of Reliance Industries. Justice A P Shah Committee on the issue of gas migrating from idling ONGC blocks to RIL’s producing gas fields, last month opined that the compensation for “unjust enrichment” by the Mukesh Ambani-run firm should go to the government and not the state-owned firm. It was of the opinion that the gas belongs to the government and so it alone deserves to be compensated. While ONGC had in May 2014 not hesitated from filing a case against RIL in the Delhi High Court and making the government a party to it, it is now vertically split on the issue. Sources said the section of the board which was responsible for the company in the first place taking up the issue of RIL producing ONGC’s gas wants the company to strongly contest the Shah committee recommendation. It feels that the Delhi High Court had given the company an option of approaching the court again if it is unsatisfied with any part of the dispute resolution. And so the company should approach the High Court again, they feel. The other section however feels it is not wise to fight with the government and the company having proved its point that gas did indeed migrate to RIL fields, should accept the recommendations, they said. But the former group however feels the premise on which Shah committee has based its recommendation was flawed as by the logic even RIL is not an owner of the gas in its KG-D6 block and it should just be paid a fixed rate of return on investment and not be given pricing and marketing freedom. The Oil Ministry has asked its technical arm DGH to quantify the amount of compensation that RIL has to pay. The Shah Committee stated, “The Government of India, and not ONGC, is entitled to claim restitution from RIL for the unjust benefit it received and unfairly retained. ONGC has no locus standi to bring a tortuous claim against RIL for trespass/conversion since it does not have any ownership rights or possessory interest in the natural gas.” The Shah Committee in its report noted and accepted the independent consultant D&M Report findings that connectivity between the reservoirs in KG-DWN-98/3 (or KG-D6) block of RIL and ONGC’s KG-DWN-98/2 and Godavari PML blocks is established. Since April 1, 2009, when RIL began production from KG- D6, to March 31, 2015, 7.009 and 4.116 billion cubic meters of gas had migrated from Godavari PML and D1 discovery of KG- DWN-98/2 block respectively to KG-D6. Of this 5.968 and 3.015 bcm of gas was produced from Godavari PML and D1 discovery of KG-DWN-98/2 block respectively, through KG-D6. The report further said by January 1, 2017, 7.519 and 4.377 bcm of gas would have migrated from Godavari PML and D1 discovery of KG-DWN-98/2 block respectively to RIL’s KG-D6. Of this, 6.549 and 3.395 BCM of gas would have been produced from Godavari PML and D1 discovery of KG-DWN-98/2 block respectively through KG-D6. Latavius Murray Authentic Jersey
Reliance Industries, ONGC face 18% cut in natural gas price
India will probably cut the price of natural gas by about 18 per cent in a setback for explorers, a survey by Bloomberg News shows. The government-set price will track a global decline and fall to less than $2.5 per million British thermal units for October through March from $3.06 currently, according to the average of 12 industry estimates. India reviews the rate half-yearly, using a formula capturing international trends. The announcement is due this week. Such a reduction would take the price to less than half the $5.05 per million British thermal units the government set when it first rolled out the formula in 2014. That could put pressure on the margins of explorers such as Oil and Natural Gas Corp. and Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries Ltd., while benefiting users including fertilizer companies and power generators. “We’re highly concerned about the fall in prices,” said Ashu Sagar, the secretary general at the Association of Oil and Gas Operators, whose members include the biggest explorers and gas producers. “The formula now doesn’t offer any floor.” India has struggled to follow US and Europe in giving natural gas a greater role for electricity production in place of polluting coal power. Lower prices threaten to hamper the investment needed to turn around flagging output of the fuel. “The government needs to encourage domestic production by ensuring a fair minimum price,” said Sachin Mehta, an analyst at Centrum Broking in Mumbai. A higher tariff of about $6.6 per million British thermal units is available for gas recovered from some deep-sea fields, under a policy change from March that prompted companies to revive plans to tap difficult deposits. That price is also due to be revised from October 1. “Gas prices are determined by an approved formula linked to some international market rates – if prices of those markets have fallen, it will reflect on domestic prices,” Oil Secretary Kapil Dev Tripathi said on September 21. Tushar Pania, a spokesman for Reliance Industries, didn’t respond to an e-mail seeking comment on the upcoming revision of gas prices. State-run ONGC, the biggest explorer in India, estimates that each dollar decrease in gas prices curtails annual revenue by 42 billion rupees ($630 million) and profit by 24 billion rupees. ONGC Chairman Dinesh Kumar Sarraf said the government may step in if parts of the exploration industry become unviable because the natural gas price falls too far. “We’re fully confident that if certain things are not viable, the government would help the industry and us,” Sarraf said in an interview, citing the step earlier this year to allow higher prices for deep-sea fields as an example. The current gas-price formula is based on US, Canadian, UK and Russian rates. Sagar from the trade association said the government needs to reassess the formula as it’s based on prices from countries where there is an oversupply of gas, unlike in India Brian Dawkins Authentic Jersey
Raj becomes first state to adopt LED street lights in all urban local bodies
Rajasthan has become the first state to adopt centre’s Street Lighting National Programme (SLNP) in all its urban local bodies (ULB). Almost5 lakh conventional street lights have been replaced with LED street lights across the state. The project has been funded by Energy Efficiency Services Limited (EESL), a Public Energy Services Company under the administration of Ministry of Power, Government of India (GoI), at no cost to the state. In a statement, Managing Director of EESL Saurabh Kumar said that Udaipur and Ajmer lead the way to energy efficiency. EESL has replaced over 35 thousand conventional street in Udaipur, with an investment of over 25 crore which has resulted in reduction of peak load by 1.4thousand kWh, making them 51% more energy efficient. The project has resulted in energy saving of 6.36 million units per annum as well as monetary savings to the municipality of over Rs 4.4 crore. In Ajmer, over 33 thousand lamps have been replaced, with an investment of over 14 crore by EESL. The project here has benefited Ajmer with reduction in peak load of 58% which translates to over 4.6 million units of energy saved per annum and over 3.7 crore in monetary savings. Through implementation of this project energy savings achieved so far have been 152 million units, and cost saving to the municipality of Rs. 60 lakh daily. This has also resulted in reduction of 225 tonnes of CO2 per day, claimed state government employees. SLNP was launched on Jan 5, 2015, as part of which 3.5 crore conventional street lights will be replaced with smart and energy efficient LED street lights by March 2019. Chandler Jones Authentic Jersey
4 Mahagenco plants shut due to no demand
For the first time in the history of the state-run generation power company Mahagenco, it has completely shut down four of its seven power plants. The total generation has gone below 2,000MW, which has also happened for the first time. The reason is no demand for power from state-run discom MSEDCL. According to Maharashtra Electricity Regulatory Commission’s (MERC’s) merit order dispatch order, MSEDCL has to buy cheap power first before going in for costlier power. As the rate of generation of Mahagenco is higher than some private plants, the company has taken a beating. A Mahagenco official said that all the units of Koradi, Khaparkheda, Bhusawal and Parli plants were offline. “Even though MSEDCL increased power supply to agricultural consumers from eights hours a day to 12, it has not helped. Heavy rains in many parts of the state has reduced demand for power. Farmers are not required to use their pumps. Moreover, the demand had increased during Ganeshotsav but now with the festival over the extra demand is no longer there. Presently, the total maximum demand is in the range of 13,500MW, which is quite low,” an official said. The official added that Parli plant was closed down last year due to water shortage. “Now there is water in its feeder dam to run two units but we are unable to start them due to lack of demand,” he added. Last month, Mahagenco had started all the five units of the 1,340MW Khaparkheda power plant but had to close all of them down within a few days. A MSEDCL official said that demand had also gone down due to increase in solar and wind generation. “The wind is strong during the rainy season and hence wind power generation has gone up. Many people are going for our solar roof top policy and this too is gradually reducing our demand,” he said. The MSEDCL has become hugely power surplus from facing an acute demand supply gap a few years ago. Fred Biletnikoff Jersey