Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation achieves ISO Certification for KG
The Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation (GSPC) has successfully implemented Quality Management Systems (QMS) at its KG Asset in line with the ISO 9001 standards, the company said in a statement Tuesday. The scope of the QMS certification was “Production, Processing, and Supply of Natural Gas & Hydrocarbon Condensate”. GSPC had hired Allied Boston Consultants India Private to assist in the implementation of the process. “While conducting their certification audit BVCI observed ‘nil’ non-conformity to ISO Standards and finally during the close out meeting held on June 13, 2016, they recommended GSPC – KG Asset for ISO 9001:2008 certification. Valid for three years, this certificate is subject to periodic audits,” the statement said. Darren Woodson Authentic Jersey
Mahanagar Gas fixes price band of Rs 380 – 421 for IPO
Mahanagar Gas Ltd (MGL), India’s second biggest CNG retailer, today fixed the price band of Rs 380-421 for its initial public offer (IPO) to raise around Rs 10.40 billion. The company, promoted by GAIL and BG Asia Pacific Holdings Pte Ltd, is making an offer for sale of up to 24,694,500 equity shares of Rs 10 each. The Mumbai-based gas distributor has proposed sale of up to 12,347,250 equity shares by Maharatna public sector undertaking GAIL and up to 12,347,250 equity shares by BG Asia Pacific. The money raised through the IPO would accrue to the promoters who are selling their stake. The IPO will open on June 21 and close on June 23. The IPO is being managed by Kotak Investment Bank and Citigroup. MGL, a major distributor of compressed natural gas (CNG) and piped natural gas (PNG) in Mumbai and adjoining areas, receives gas at its stations located at Wadala, Mahape, Ambernath and Taloja through pipelines owned by GAIL. “We plan to increase penetration in Mumbai and its adjoining areas by reaching out to new customers for CNG, domestic PNG, commercial PNG and industry PNG use. We are also expanding our pipeline network and adding more CNG stations. We have a supply network of over 4,600 kms pipelines,” MGL Managing Director Rajeev Mathur told reporters here. The company is now looking at rolling out similar facilities to distribute CNG and PNG in Raigad and other cities across the country, Mathur said. MGL has recently been awarded licence for Raigad district in the fourth round of bidding. The Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board has identified several new areas for future bidding, for which MGL would bid in subsequent rounds, he said. Mathur said in the last decade, the demand for natural gas has gone up due to increased availability, development of natural gas transmission and distribution infrastructure and environment-friendly characterristics of natural gas. The government is also encouraging use of green fuel. Brooks Reed Authentic Jersey
Shell Lubricants India appoints Mansi Madan Tripathy as new MD
Mansi, former CMO, Shell Lubricants India Cluster, to take over her new role with effect from August 1, 2016. Shell Lubricants India announced the appointment of Mansi Madan Tripathy as the new Managing Director of the company. Mansi, former CMO of Shell Lubricants, would succeed Nitin Prasad, who moves on to take over as the Chairman of Shell Companies in India with effect from August 1st, 2016. Mansi brings in 20 years of marketing, sales, insights and strategy experience to the office. In her new role, she will be responsible for leading all the business activities for the Lubricants business in India, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal. Mansi has been the architect of digital marketing and social media footprints for Shell Lubricants in India. According to an official statement, Mansi has been an advocate of a new direction; weaving ‘direct consumer connect’, ‘industry influencer engagement’ and ‘greater awareness initiatives’ intractably into the company’s brand marketing strategies. “As MD, her focus shall be to strengthen the company’s presence in India, delighting our customers and consumers and building an organisation that’s motivated and growing. Building and maintaining relationships with key business stakeholders and streamlining the efforts of Shell Lubricants across the country shall also be an important aspect of her new role.” Prior to Shell Lubricants, Mansi’s experience spans across 17 years at P&G in key positions like Director for Global Male Grooming, P&G and Asia Pacific Head for Consumer and Market Knowledge. She has worked across countries like Geneva, Singapore and Boston; working on diverse product categories, new initiatives and equity development of global brands like Pantene, Olay, Vicks, Gillette, Pampers, Whisper, Ariel and Tide. Mansi is a B. Tech degree holder in Electronics and communication from National Institute of Technology Kurukshetra and an MBA in Marketing from S.P. Jain Institute of Management & Research. Tony Watson Womens Jersey
OVL puts on hold 11% buy in Rosneft Vankorneft; ball in Narendra Modi court for better deal?
The board of ONGC Videsh (OVL) has put on hold a proposal for acquisition of 11% in Rosneft’s Vankorneft that runs the Vankor oil and gas fields in East Siberia. The OVL board wants the government-owned explorer to negotiate a “better price” for the 11% deal as compared with a 15% purchase in the same asset in September 2015. “The Board wants OVL to negotiate the Vankor deal for a better price,” said an official privy to the developments. OVL, the overseas arm of India’s flagship explorer ONGC, forked out $1.268 billion or around $3.4/barrel for 15% stake in Vankorneft. The additional 11% would cost another $930 million. When contacted, Narendra K Verma, managing director of OVL declined to comment on the issue. Interestingly, a consortium of Indian public sector companies including Indian Oil Corporation (IOC), Oil India (OIL) and Bharat PetroResources (BPRL) are on the last leg of finalising a 23.9% purchase in Vankorneft at the same rates, which OVL paid in September. These firms would fork out $3-3.5 billion for the stake in Vankorneft along with another 29.9% of Russia’s Rosneft-operated Taas-Yuryakh oil and gas fields and final agreements are expected to be signed in June. It may become difficult for OVL to negotiate and sweeten the deal with Rosneft after Indian consortium agrees to go-ahead with same price. Earlier, OVL wanted to pick up entire 49.9% stake in Vankorneft by itself. However, other Indian firms including IOC showed keenness to pick up equity stake in the producing asset. Had OVL bought the 49.9% stake in Vankorneft, its hydrocarbon production portfolio would have shot up by 11 million tons in a single year. In FY16, OVL’s output stood at 8.914 million tons of oil equivalent (mtoe), hardly 1% more than the 8.874 mtoe it had produced in the previous year. Rosneft’s chief executive Igor Sechin visited New Delhi in March to sign the preliminary heads of agreement (HoA) for the acquisitions with Indian companies. It is to be seen if Prime Minister Narendra Modi-government could push its diplomatic relationship with Kremlin to get a better deal for OVL. New Delhi’s interest in increasing economic co-operation with Kremlin is seen as an extension of several rounds of talks between Prime Minister Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin. Currently, the production at Vankorneft is hovering around 4,42,000 barrels per day, double the output of Barmer, India’s largest onshore field, which is operated by Cairn India. OVL share would be 66,000 barrels per day. OVL is selling the crude oil overseas. Vankorneft, Rosneft subsidiary, was established in 2004 for development of Vankor oil and gas condensate field – the largest of the fields, discovered and put into operation in Russia in the last 25 years. The field is situated in the Turukhansky district of Krasnoyarsk Territory, 142 km away from the city of Igarka. The initial recoverable reserves of the Vankor field by the January 1 2015 are estimated at 476 million tons of oil and condensate and 173 billion cubic meters of gas. The acreage of the field is 447 square km. Norichika Aoki Authentic Jersey
Government panel to prepare road map for raising refining capacity
With India’s oil demand projected to more than double in 25 years, government has formed an expert group to prepare blueprint for raising refining capacity by 2040. The 12-member Working Group for preparing Approach Paper for enhancing refining capacity by 2040 will be headed by Additional Secretary in the Oil Ministry and include directors of refineries at Indian Oil Corp (IOC), Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL). It would also comprise of representatives of private sector Reliance Industries and Essar Oil besides managing directors of Numaligarh Refineries Ltd, Mangalore Refineries Ltd and Chennai Petroleum Corp Ltd (CPCL), an oil ministry order constituting the Group said. India has a refining capacity of 232.066 million tons, which exceeded the demand of 183.5 MT in 2015-16 fiscal. According to International Energy Agency (EA), this demand is forecast to reach 458 MT by 2040. “India is one of the fastest developing countries in the world and simultaneously, the world energy demand is expected to double in the next 30 years with energy portfolio undergoing a transition to one that includes a wide range of sources,” said an oil ministry order constituting the Group. Expansions underway will raise the refining capacity to about 260 MT by 2018. The rise in projected demand, the order said, paves the way for gradual shift towards renewable and cleaner fuels richer in hydrogen or to neat hydrogen. “It has been envisioned that the energy mix in 2040 could be entirely different from what it is today. Also, new capacities in petroleum refining will depend upon aggregation of demand from different petroleum derived products, which itself depends upon substitution by other forms of energy and government policies,” it said. It was felt that an approach paper for refinery capacity expansion of PSU refineries by the year 2040 needs to be prepared for meeting the growing demand of petroleum products in the country, the order said. The Working Group would be required to “assess primary energy requirement for 2040” as also “assess likely technological developments in different energy fields”, it said, adding that it would then “develop primary energy mix with breakup in terms of gas, oil, coal, nuclear Jeff Heuerman Womens Jersey
IOC team to survey Nepal-India petroleum pipeline
The Indian Oil Corporation (IOC) will send its team led by its executive director to Nepal for the survey of 41-km long cross-border pipeline next week. After completion of the survey, the team will submit its report to the Project Monitoring Committee led by Uttam Nagila, joint secretary at the Ministry of Supplies. The monitoring committee has been set up as a single window mechanism to facilitate project implementation. After conducting the survey, IOC, which is the implementing agency for Amlekhganj-Raxaul Petroleum Pipeline Project, will call for a bid for the construction of pipeline and expansion of Amlekhganj Depot on Nepal side. Though an agreement between the two countries was signed on August 24 for early construction of the pipeline, the project was stalled for long due to disruptions in supply lines from India owing to tensions along the border points. As the supply from India returned to normalcy after the four-month long border blockade ended in February, the recently held talks between Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) and IOC decided to construct the pipeline project as soon as possible. The cross-border pipeline project, which also includes re-engineering of Amlekhganj Depot, is going to be constructed at a total cost of INR 2.75 billion within 30 months of beginning the construction works. After that, it would be the lifeline for importing petroleum products from India. The proposed pipeline is expected to save Rs 700 million per annum in transporting fuel from Raxaul to Amlekhganj. Subsequently, it will save travel time for tankers, not to mention minimise pilferages. On the other hand, construction of the pipeline will no longer require tankers to transport fuel across the border, which in turn is also expected to ease congestion at Raxaul-Birgunj customs point and smoothen the import of other goods through India. IOC’s Raxaul Depot caters to 60 per cent of the petroleum products imported into the country. During the recent meeting led by secretary of Ministry of Supplies and NOC Chairman Shreedhar Sapkota and IOC Chairman B Ashok, both sides agreed to work towards early construction of pipeline and increase the supply of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) to address the prolonged crisis of cooking fuel in Nepal, as per NOC Spokesperson Mukunda Prasad Ghimire. “Once the IOC team submits its survey report, the Project Monitoring Committee should clear all the issues, like acquisition of land and right of the way, for the pipeline to accelerate the project construction,” Ghimire explained. As per the preliminary estimates, the pipeline will be laid along the Raxaul-Amlekhganj road. Apart from this, the government needs to acquire 30 hectares of land near Amlekhganj Depot for its expansion. Out of the 41-km pipeline, about 39 km would lie in Nepal. During the recent meeting, IOC also agreed to provide additional 10,000 tons of cooking gas to Nepal to address the prolonged shortage caused by disruptions in supply lines. The additional cooking fuel will be provided from Paradeep of Odisha State, which is nearly 1,100 km far from Birgunj. “This will be a one-time supply to meet the current demand,” said Ghimire. Currently, three refineries of IOC are providing regular supply of LPG — 11,000 tons per month from Haldia, 10,000 tons per month from Barauni and 6,000 tons per month from Karnal. Greg Luzinski Womens Jersey
Reliance, Essar’s fuel-retail operations have gained from deregulation
In late 2014, when the government allowed market pricing of diesel, oil marketing companies (or OMCs as they are called in India) feared that they would begin losing share to private retailers. After all, the only reason private retailers such as Reliance Industries and Essar Oil had failed in their first attempt to crack open the market in the 2000s was the fact that they had no control over prices. The OMCs—IndianOil Corp. Ltd (IOCL), Bharat Petroleum Corp. Ltd (BPCL) and Hindustan Petroleum Corp. Ltd (HPCL)—expected Reliance Industries and Essar Oil to take three to four years to garner a 5-8% market share. It’s happened much faster. In less than two years, RIL and Essar Oil have cornered nearly 5% of the fuel retail market. “Private players have captured 4.7% market share in 2015-16; h IOCL and BPCL lost 1% each; HPCL lost 0.3%,” said Dhaval Joshi and Nilesh Ghuge of Emkay Global Financial Services, a domestic brokerage, in a note dated 27 May. While deregulation of petrol and diesel prices has augured well for RIL and Essar Oil, their cause has also been helped by cheaper crude oil, stable fuel prices and rise in demand, the note added. Brent crude, the global benchmark, closed at $49.20 on Monday, down 46% from October 2014 levels when it was at $90.94 per barrel. Crude was trading at $115.71 on 19 June 2014. While petrol prices were deregulated or market-linked in June 2010, diesel prices were market-linked only in October 2014, phasing out subsidies and making the fuel market attractive for RIL and Essar Oil which could, as a result of the change, sell petrol and diesel at the same rate as that of OMCs. Historically, diesel was sold at subsidised prices in India, with the government compensating the OMCs later. Private fuel marketers received no such subsidy, and were thus edged out of the market when crude oil prices climbed as high as $150 a barrel in 2008. To combat competition, state-owned oil companies plan to spend Rs.25,000 million to open close to 3,100 fuel stations this financial year even as their rivals from the private sector step on the gas. The three OMCs together sell over 95% of all petrol and diesel consumed in India. Officials from the OMCs admit they expect tough competition from private companies but add that they have already undertaken several measures, including automating retail outlets and strengthening their customer loyalty programs, to beat competition. “We are aware of the expansion that RIL and Essar Oil have undertaken. But we will be expanding too. We have also introduced automation, better customer interface and a transparent mechanism in terms of billing. We don’t expect RIL and Essar to capture more than 8-10% market share,” said a BPCL official who spoke on condition of anonymity. BPCL plans to open around 500 outlets this financial year at a cost of Rs.4000-5000 million. It opened 630 outlets last year. It has automated 8,000 of its 13,000-odd retail outlets so far. HPCL, the second largest fuel retailer which opened 590 outlets last year, plans to open 800 outlets this year at a cost of Rs.9000 million. “We have a 26% market share in the fuel retailing segment. But with the measures that we are putting in place, we will continue to grow,” said an HPCL official, who did not wish to be identified. The HPCL official added that the company is confident about the stickiness of its loyalty schemes and the revenue it can generate from the non-fuel segment. Meanwhile, private fuel retailers are expanding too. Last quarter, RIL said it may look at opening new fuel retail outlets later this year. RIL has been re-opening its retail outlets and had re-started 950 of its 1,400 retail outlets till April 2016. RIL had around 14% market share in fuel retailing in 2005-06, but had to shut down its outlets in 2008 as crude oil hit $150 a barrel and lack of subsidies made the business unviable. Essar Oil has 2,100 fuel retail outlets commissioned. It plans to have a total of 5,000 retail outlets. This will make it the largest private fuel retailer in India. India’s fuel demand jumped 11% in 2015-16, the fastest in two decades, according to data from the government’s Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell. Demand for diesel, which accounts for roughly 40% of India’s total oil products demand, rose 15.12% over the previous year to a record high of 6.78 million metric tons (mmt). Petrol consumption was up 14.5% to 21.8 mmt Zack Kassian Jersey
RIL sells entire 76% GAPCO stake
Reliance Exploration and Production DMCC, an indirect wholly owned subsidiary of Reliance Industries Ltd and Total, have executed agreements to sell the entire 76 per cent interest held by the former in the Mauritius-incorporated Gulf Africa Petroleum Corporation (“GAPCO”), RIL said in a press statement. The proposed transaction is subject to regulatory approvals and other closing conditions that are customary for similar transactions. GAPCO is a holding company with operating subsidiaries in Tanzania, Kenya and Uganda which are primarily engaged in petroleum product import, and trading, storage, distribution, marketing, supply and transportation of oil products in East Africa. Since the acquisition of 76 per cent equity interest in GAPCO by REPDMCC in 2007, GAPCO has significantly grown and is one of leading petroleum marketing company in East Africa, which now operates 108 retail outlets and owns 260 TKL of storage capacity, the company said. REPDMCC’s agreement to sell its interest in GAPCO is part of a joint transaction, wherein both REPDMCC and the minority shareholder have agreed to sell their entire respective holdings in GAPCO for cash. The net proceeds for the sale will be finalized on completion of the transaction which is expected to be within the coming months, the statement added. S&P retains RIL rating, outlook; sees Jio rollout by FY17-end International ratings agency Standard & Poor’s (S&P) today affirmed the BBB+ rating on Reliance Industries with stable outlook, citing likely fall in its leverage due to improved operational performance. “We reaffirm the rating of RIL to reflect our expectation of significant improvement in its operating performance over the next three years. This will help return RIL’s financial leverage back to levels comfortable for the rating,” S&P said in a note. On the stable outlook, the agency said, “It reflects our expectation that RIL’s leverage will significantly improve over the next two years with the debt-to-Ebitda ratio close to 2 times. “It also shows our expectation that RIL will continue to maintain its operating performance, and its competitive position will be supported by timely commissioning of large projects in refinery and petrochemical businessover the next 12 months.” The agency further said it expects improvement in RIL’s operating performance over the next three years from commissioning of large refinery and petrochemical projects as well as rollout of its much-delayed telecom operations, S&P’s Global Ratings Analyst Mehul Sukkawala said. He expects RIL to report an Ebitda CAGR of about 23 per cent over the next three years as the low oil prices have already helped its operating performance. RIL is close to commissioning its multi-billion dollar expansion of its petrochemical project, ethane import project, a petcoke gasification unit, and a refinery off-gas cracker facility over the next 12 months. “We believe improvement in operating performance will enable RIL to reduce its leverage over the next three years. This is despite our expectation that its capex will be 70 per cent higher over the next two years, primarily because of faster and wider rollout of telecom operations. “We expect the ratio of debt-to-Ebidta to decline to about 2 times by fiscal 2018 and fall further to below 1.5 times by fiscal 2019 from the current moderately high level of about 2.8 times in fiscal 2016,” he said. In addition to increasing petrochemical capacity, the projects will increase the integration of refinery and petrochemical operations as well as improve the cost position of the petrochemical and refinery business, he said. “We also expect RIL to commercially launch its 4G telecom operations RJio over the next six months and roll out by the end of the current fiscal. We believe 4G combined with its telecom spectrum portfolio offers a competitive advantage to provide high-quality voice and high-speed data services,” Sukkawala said. Hardy Nickerson Authentic Jersey
Regulator allows GAIL to hike tariff on sections of Cauvery pipeline
GAIL (India) Ltd will be allowed to more than double the tariff on two sub-networks of the Cauvery Basin Natural Gas Pipeline from 2016-17 after the Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board (PNGRB) approved the increase. In a tariff order passed by the PNGRB on May 27 and made public on Monday, the regulator has set the tariff for the 230 km Narimanam and Kuthalam (NKM) sub-network at RS.7.47 per million British thermal unit till March 31, 2016 and at RS.17.41 per million British thermal unit from April 1, 2016. For the Ramnad (RMD) sub-network on the Cauvery Basin Natural Gas Pipeline, the regulator has set the tariff at RS.3.07 per million British thermal unit till March 31, 2016 and from April 1, 2016 the tariff will be RS.16.63 per million British thermal unit. In both cases, the tariff set has been lower than that sought by GAIL (India) Ltd. The company had sought RS.43.58 per million British thermal unit for the NKM sub-network from April 1, 2015 onwards while for the RMD sub-network, it had sought RS.17.81 from the same date. Meanwhile, GAIL also announced that it has started drilling its second exploratory well as an operator in its New Exploration Licensing Policy — IX block in the Cambay basin. The well is situated in the Nabhoi village in Tarapur Tehsil of Anand District in Gujarat. Ryan Johansen Authentic Jersey
Regulator allows GAIL to hike tariff on sections of Cauvery pipeline
GAIL (India) Ltd will be allowed to more than double the tariff on two sub-networks of the Cauvery Basin Natural Gas Pipeline from 2016-17 after the Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board (PNGRB) approved the increase. In a tariff order passed by the PNGRB on May 27 and made public on Monday, the regulator has set the tariff for the 230 km Narimanam and Kuthalam (NKM) sub-network at RS.7.47 per million British thermal unit till March 31, 2016 and at RS.17.41 per million British thermal unit from April 1, 2016. For the Ramnad (RMD) sub-network on the Cauvery Basin Natural Gas Pipeline, the regulator has set the tariff at RS.3.07 per million British thermal unit till March 31, 2016 and from April 1, 2016 the tariff will be RS.16.63 per million British thermal unit. In both cases, the tariff set has been lower than that sought by GAIL (India) Ltd. The company had sought RS.43.58 per million British thermal unit for the NKM sub-network from April 1, 2015 onwards while for the RMD sub-network, it had sought RS.17.81 from the same date. On Monday, GAIL’s shares closed 0.05 per cent higher on the BSE at RS.379.60. Meanwhile, GAIL also announced that it has started drilling its second exploratory well as an operator in its New Exploration Licensing Policy — IX block in the Cambay basin. The well is situated in the Nabhoi village in Tarapur Tehsil of Anand District in Gujarat. Josh Jones Authentic Jersey