Domestic natural gas production increased 23% to 2,868 million standard cubic metre (mscm) in November on a year-on-year (y-o-y) basis, mainly due to higher production from Reliance Industries (RIL) and from BP’s ultra-deep-water field in the KG-D6 Block of the Krishna Godavari basin on the east coast.
The output had fallen 8.1% Y-o-Y to 28,670.6 mscm in FY21, but had subsequently increased 21% y-o-y to 16,890.9 mscm in the April-September period of the ongoing fiscal. Production also commenced on August 31 from state-run ONGC’s U1B deep-water gas well located in KG-DWN 98/2 block, which has an estimated peak production of 1.2 mscmd.
The rise in domestic production coincided with a substantial jump in international LNG prices, resulting in import dependency of natural gas reducing from 55.3% in April-October, 2020 to 49.3% in the corresponding period this year.