Shirish Nadkarni
OGJ Correspondent
MUMBAI, Mar. 17 -- The Indian government granted the request of Oil & Natural Gas Corp. (ONGC) to change the status of its oil and gas block in the Mahanadi basin from a shallow to deep water, which gives the state-owned company an additional year to explore it.
Official sources said a committee of secretaries approved the status change request for the entire block. ONGC had sought a change in status for its MN-OSN-2000/2 block, since the discovery had been in deep water at depths of about 990 m.
Operator ONGC has a 40% equity share in the block, which was awarded to it under the second round of the New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP-II). Other partners are GAIL (India), Indian Oil Corp., and Oil India Ltd. (OIL), each with a 20% stake.
Meanwhile, ONGC is negotiating with 12 international companies for developing deep and ultradeep fields in the Mahanadi and Krishna-Godavari (K-G) basins. R.S. Sharma, ONGC chairman and managing director, identified those firms only as "top players in the energy arena." ONGC and Royal Dutch Shell PLC have already reached an understanding for joint bidding under the forthcoming seventh licensing round, NELP-VII. According to Sharma, oil fields in the K-G basin hold as much as 6.76 tcf of gas reserves.
"We have inked memoranda of understanding with Eni [SPA] of Italy, Petroleo Brasileiro SA (Petrobras) of Brazil, and StatoilHydro of Norway," he said. "Petrobras and ONGC will be partners in offshore exploration and production activities in India and Brazil."
ONGC and Eni will focus on sharing deepwater drilling rigs. Eni holds a 60% equity stake, along with operator rights, in the deepwater block Mer Tres Profonde Nord in the Republic of Congo.
The Indian explorer is also operator of the Mahanadi deepwater block MN-DWN-2002/1 block, and holds a 70% equity stake, with OIL holding 20% and Bharat Petroleum 10%.
ONGC's deal with StatoilHydro is for developing carbon dioxide capture, clean development mechanism, and other climate change projects. The MOU was signed Feb. 6 with the intent of gaining practical experience that would help ONGC implement its carbon credit projects in the fast-track mode, besides gaining access to climate change technologies.
