Energy Sector - 2

[Naresh]

<b>Capt. Manmohan Kumar Ji :</b>

Re your post of Today, 01:44 AM.

Is this what you wanted to post? :

[center]<b><span style='font-size:21pt;line-height:100%'>Reliance KG capex soars to $5billion</span></b><!--emo&:clapping--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/clap.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='clap.gif' /><!--endemo-->[/center]

NEW DELHI: Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) will boost the capital expenditure projections for its Krishna Godavari (KG) discovery. The company plans to double its investment in the D6 block, off the coast of Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh, to $5.2 billion from about $2.6 billion projected two years ago.

The project is expected to be operational by 2008-09. The RIL board will review the project and its financing plan on November 9, 2006. It will examine various funding options, said a company statement.

RIL had submitted its plans to the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons (DGH) for approval last week. VK Sibal, director general, hydrocarbons, said: “We are studying the new development plan. May be within the next 20-21 days we will be in a position to draw conclusions.”

RIL has almost doubled its reserve projections to 11.3 trillion cubic feet from 5.32 tcf estimated in the initial plan that was submitted in May 2004 and approved in November 2004.

The company had announced the gas discovery in this block in 2002. The government had jointly awarded the deepwater block, KG-DWN-98/3, to RIL and Calgary-based Niko Resources Ltd during the first round of auction of oil and gas blocks under the New Exploration and Licensing Policy (NELP).

“RIL has also obtained independent assessment of 2P (probable and proven) reserves for the Dhirubhai-1 and Dhirubhai-3 gas discoveries at 11.3 tcf which is almost double of the earlier estimates,” the statement said.

Based on the estimation, RIL, in its new field development plan, has projected that the plateau (when gas production will be the highest) period will last for nine years starting 2008-09 during which it hopes to produce 80 million standard cubic metre a day (mmscmd) of natural gas instead of 40 mmscmd projected in the earlier plan, sources said.

The production rate of 80 mmscmd is equivalent to 450,000 barrels of oil equivalent a day — that is about 25% of the current oil import in the country, the company said.

The company plans to put up facilities for handling 120 mmscmd at the terminal point at Kakinada. In the new plan, the company also plans to drill a total of 50 development wells till 2008-09 compared with 34 development wells projected earlier.

Cheers <!--emo&:beer--><img src='style_emoticons/<#EMO_DIR#>/cheers.gif' border='0' style='vertical-align:middle' alt='cheers.gif' /><!--endemo-->