New Delhi, June 9: The group of ministers (GoM) constituted by the Prime Minister earlier this year to evolve a `India Hydrocarbon Vision 2020' resolved on Wednesday to submit a full-fledged strategy paper to the Prime Minister within six weeks. At the end of a brainstorming at Union finance minister Yashwant Sinha's chambers at North Block, the high-level panel constituted six sub-groups to evolve development strategies for key issues concerning the hydrocarbon sector, like pricing and tariff reforms and restructuring of the oil industry. The sub-groups will submit their interim recommendations within four weeks, said secretary in the Prime Minister's Office, N K Singh. Singh is member-secretary of the select group of economic policy-makers. Finance minister Yaswant Sinha chairs the group, which also comprise Union minister for petroleum and natural gas, V K Ramamurthy, Union external affairs minister Jaswant Singh and deputy chairman of the Planning Commission, K C Pant.The sub-panels constituted onWednesday will evolve policies on oil exploration and production and infrastructure for the industry, including refining, marketing and transportation. A sub-group will focus on a long-term policy for the development and utilisation of natural gas, including liquefied natural gas (LNG), coal bed methane and gas hydrates. A separate policy paper will be evolved on external interface of the oil and gas industry, which has so long remained within the insulated confines of price and distribution controls, not to mention state-sector monopoly. The sub-group will delve into strategies for external interface of the coal, oil and gas industry, both upstream and downstream, and take a close look at energy security.
A separate sub-group will study environment and technical data on the hydrocarbon industry. Singh told newspersons after the meeting that the thrust of the group would be on `mid to long-term strategies' that could make India a major player in the hydrocarbon sector.
The group evolved after PrimeMinister Atal Behari Vajpayee announced a policy paper on a 20-year hydrocarbon vision at the Petrotech conference in January. The group will strive to assess the country's energy and infrastructure requirements in the year's ahead and identify strategies for tackling demand and supply mismatches.
Since then the petroleum minister has constituted as many as eight sub-groups to recommend policies on specific issues, like developing non-conventional alternatives to oil and gas, like CBM. The petroleum ministry then made a presentation to the group of ministers, projecting a more than 50 million tonne jump in demand for oil and gas at the end of the Ninth Five Year Plan, to 144.3 million tonne.
Petroleum products consumption within the country currently hovers around 90 million tonne, not counting the use of natural gas. The expert groups felt that oil and gas, which now accounts for 40 per cent of the primary commercial energy, would continue to be the key source of it in the decades ahead. They saw theneed to enhance hydrocarbon exploration efforts at home and overseas and to tap new sources of energy like gas hydrates and coal bed methane gas. The hydrocarbon policy paper comes at a time when the oil and gas industry at home is in the process of moulting into market-oriented companies from state-controlled monopolies.
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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