India’s ONGC makes offshore oil, gas discoveries

Spanish Market: Crude oil, Natural gas
12/05/23

India's state-controlled upstream firm ONGC has made what it describes as a key crude oil and gas discovery in the country's western offshore basin.

ONGC has discovered exploration wells MBS171HAA-1 named Amrit and MBS182HDA-1 named Monga in block MB-OSHP-2017/1 in the Mumbai offshore region in the Arabian Sea.

Details of the reserves are yet to be released. "[A] detailed assessment of the discoveries is in progress," ONGC said on 11 May.

The block was awarded to the company as part of India's Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP). The OALP was introduced in 2017 to attract major oil and gas firms to develop India's upstream sector.

ONGC previously made a key gas discovery in exploration well MBS171HAA-1 in the Mumbai offshore region with a gas flowing rate of 145,093 m³/d from the Panna Formation. This discovery is so far the deepest recorded presence of a commercial pool in the sector at a depth of 3,800m, ONGC said in February.

These discoveries could provide a boost to India's domestic production at a time when it is struggling to meet its upstream output goals and reduce reliance on oil and gas imports.

India's crude and condensate production of 586,000 b/d for the April 2022-March 2023 fiscal year was around 9pc below its target of 641,000 b/d for the year with imports of 4.67mn b/d meeting 87pc of demand, oil ministry data show. India produced 34bn m³ of natural gas in 2022-23, up by 2pc from a year earlier but well below its consumption of 60.3bn m³.

State-controlled ONGC produced 390,000 b/d of crude and condensate during 2022-23, below its target of around 424,000 b/d, but stable from a year earlier. ONGC accounts for 70pc of India's natural gas and 60pc of oil production.

The firm has already started oil and gas production from the Western Offshore-16 (WO-16) cluster earlier this year with the commissioning of its offshore drilling rig Sagar Samrat as a mobile offshore production unit, which will handle up to 20,000 b/d of crude and has a maximum export gas capacity of 2.36mn m³/d.

WO-16 is a cluster of four marginal fields in the Arabian Sea at water depth of 75-80m and distance of 130km from Mumbai. ONGC has also started producing 200,000 m³/d of gas from an appraisal well at its SB-20 block from its WO fields. The block has a potential total capacity of 2.1bn m³.

ONGC plans to invest $3.5bn in several projects in the western offshore fields. The investment will enhance oil and gas production from the region, arrest a decline in crude production and develop old fields, ONGC's company director (offshore) Pankaj Kumar said during the India Energy Week earlier this year.

By Rituparna Ghosh

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