Lok Sabha Question No. 2475 (UNSTARRED), answered on 2023-08-03
Subject: Natural Gas and Oil Reserves
Ministry: PETROLEUM AND NATURAL GAS
Asked by: Nihal Chand Chauhan

## LOK SABHA UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 2475

## TO BE ANSWERED ON 3 rd  AUGUST, 2023

## Natural Gas and Oil Reserves

## 2475.  SHRI NIHAL CHAND:

पेोिलयम और ाक ृ ितक गैस मंी

## Will the Minister of PETROLEUM AND NATURAL GAS be pleased to state:

- (a)  whether  the  Union  Government  is  working  on  any  scheme  to  identify  the  locations  of natural gas and oil reserves in the country;
- (b)  if  so,  whether  any  research  regarding  the  availability  of  petroleum  and  natural  gas reserves has been conducted in Rajasthan and if so, the details thereof;
- (c) the percentage of the petroleum products available in the country as per our requirement;
- (d) the percentage of oil and gas imported from foreign countries; and
- (e) the steps being taken by the Union Government to reduce the dependency on oil and gas import?

## ANSWER

पेोिलयम और ाक ृ ितक गैस मंालय म राय मंी ( ी रामेर तेली )

## MINISTER OF STATE IN THE MINISTRY OF PETROLEUM & NATURAL GAS (SHRI RAMESWAR TELI)

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(a): Hydrocarbon exploration is a continuous activity that inter-alia comprises seismic data acquisition,  processing,  interpretation,  well  drilling  and  other  exploration  activities  (like Airborne  Gravity  Gradiometry,  etc.).  Various  such  exploratory  activities  are  carried  out, under  the  Hydrocarbon  Exploration  Licensing  Policy  (HELP),  New  Exploration  Licensing Policy (NELP), Pre-NELP/Nomination Regimes, by National Oil Companies (NOCs) like Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC), Oil India Limited (OIL) and other private operators with  whom  the  Government  of  India  has  signed  Revenue  Sharing  Contracts  (RSCs)  and Production Sharing Contracts (PSCs). In addition, the Government of India has commissioned the following survey projects:

|   Sl. No. | Project Name                                     |
|-----------|--------------------------------------------------|
|         1 | National Seismic Programme (NSP)                 |
|         2 | Deep Andaman Offshore project                    |
|         3 | Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZ) Survey (Offshore) |
|         4 | Airborne Gravity and Gradiometry (AGG) Survey    |

- (b): Reserve figures for the year 2022-23 for the State of Rajasthan based on data received in Directorate  General  of  Hydrocarbons  (DGH)  annually  at  the  end  of  fiscal  year  from Exploration and Production companies working in the State are as under:
- (c)  and  (d):  The  percentage  of  the  petroleum  products  available  in  the  country  and  the percentage of oil and gas imported from foreign countries are as under:

The In-place and Reserves are of 2P category (Proven reserves and Probable reserves).

| State     | In-place   | In-place   | Reserves   | Reserves   |
|-----------|------------|------------|------------|------------|
|           | Oil (MMT)  | Gas (BCM)  | Oil (MMT)  | Gas (BCM)  |
| Rajasthan | 611.8      | 166.1      | 26.6       | 51.5       |

MMT: Million Metric Tonne

BCM: Billion Cubic Meter

|   Sl. No. | Details                                                                                        |   2020- 2021 |   2021- 2022 |   2022-23 (Provisional) |
|-----------|------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------|--------------|--------------|-------------------------|
|         1 | Petroleum products availability in the country over domestic consumption since 2020-21 (in %). |        113.2 |        114.3 |                   112.1 |
|         2 | Percentage of oil and gas imported from foreign countries since 2020-21 (in %).                |         77.6 |         77   |                    78.6 |

Source: PPAC

- (e): The Government has taken various long/short term policy initiatives to increase domestic oil and gas production which inter-alia include:

## 1. Long term Policy initiatives:

- i. Discovered Small Field Policy, 2015.
- ii. Hydrocarbon Exploration and Licensing Policy, 2016.
- iii. Policy for early monetization of Coal Bed Methane 2017
- iv. Setting up of National Data Repository, 2017.
- v. Re-assessment of Hydrocarbon Resources 2017
- vi. Policy to Promote and Incentivize Enhanced Recovery Methods for Oil and Gas, 2018.
- vii. Policy framework for Exploration and exploitation of Coal Bed Methane (CBM) from areas under Coal Mining Lease allotted to Coal India Limited (CIL) and its subsidiaries 2018.
- viii. Policy Framework for Exploration and Exploitation of Unconventional Hydrocarbons under Existing Production Contracts and Nomination Fields, 2018.
- ix. Reforms  in  Hydrocarbon  Exploration  and  Licensing  Policy  for  enhancing  domestic exploration and production of oil and gas 2019.

## 2. Short and medium term initiatives:

- i. Early Monetization of Existing Discoveries.
- ii. Improving Recovery Factor through implementation of Improved Oil Recovery (IOR) and Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) techniques.
- iii. Revival of sick wells.
- iv. Renewal of Facilities and other infrastructure.
- v. Monetization of small and marginal discoveries in onshore through service contract and outsourcing.
- vi. Redevelopment of existing matured fields and development of new fields/marginal fields.

vii. Induction of suitable technologies on selective fields.

Further, to reduce imports and improve energy security, the Government has adopted strategy comprising,  promoting  energy  efficiency  and  conservation  measures,  giving  thrust  on demand substitution, promoting biofuels and other alternate fuels/ renewables, and refinery process improvements.

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