The country intends to increase its exploration acreage to 1 million sq km by 2030. Only 10 percent of India’s 26 sedimentary basins, containing substantial reserves of crude oil and natural gas, is currently under exploration. The Government intends to explore 16 percent sedimentary basin area by 2024.
Jul 19 2024
The Exploration and Production (E&P) sector in India is offering investment opportunities worth 100 billion USD by 2030, said Mr. Hardeep Singh Puri, Union Minister of Petroleum & Natural Gas.
Underscoring the importance of the Exploration and Production (E&P) sector in achieving energy self-sufficiency and sustaining economic growth, Mr. Puri said the Government of India intended to increase India’s exploration acreage to 1 million sq km by 2030.
The Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MoPNG) has instituted sweeping reforms in the E&P sector to empower stakeholders to contribute to the nation’s progress, added Mr. Puri.
He highlighted the vast potential of India’s 26 sedimentary basins, containing substantial reserves of crude oil and natural gas yet to be fully tapped.
Mr. Puri said that initiatives like the Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP) and the Discovered Small Field (DSF) Policy have accelerated the pace of exploration activities.
Despite substantial progress, only 10 percent of India’s sedimentary basin area is under exploration today. After the award of blocks under the forthcoming Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP) Rounds, the figure was likely to increase to 16 percent by the end of 2024, he added.
Through the first 8 OALP bid rounds, a total of 144 blocks covering approximately 244,007 sq km have been awarded. The recently announced OALP IX round offered an area of approximately 136,596 sq km spread over eight sedimentary basins, with the vision of expanding the nation’s footprint in offshore exploration, he noted.
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He said the DSF Policy, since its inception in 2015, has garnered investments of approximately 2 billion USD and brought in 29 new players in the field.
Highlighting the focus of the Government on promoting scientific data-driven exploration, Mr. Puri said that an investment of INR 7,500 crore was going into the acquisition of new seismic data, including that of the EEZ, financing stratigraphic wells, and acquiring aerial survey data for difficult terrains.
