New Delhi, February 4
British energy major Cairn Energy has struck oil in Rajasthan with the discovery of a medium-sized oil and gas field in Barmer district. The field is estimated to have a total reserve of 20 million tonnes.
“I hope these discoveries would be commercialised soon and we expect production from the region to around a million tonnes every year”, Petroleum Minister Ram Naik said while speaking at a function for the signing of 23 production-sharing contracts under the NELP III.
With this discovery in
Barmer
the total known oil reserves in Rajasthan have increased to 34 million tonnes.The minister said oil was discovered at Well RJE-1 of the pre-NELP Block RJ/ON/90-1. Cairn Energy holds 100 per cent stake in the field. He said that estimates suggest that 200 barrels of oil and 7.3 MMSCFD of gas flowed through the well at a depth of 1241 metres and 1338 metres. The American Petroleum Index of the oil was 30 degrees and was sweet and waxy in quality.
On the fourth round of the NELP, Mr Naik said the government was expecting to complete the activities by the first week of April. This will also include a few blocks in Rajasthan.
He said 23 blocks for which PSCs were signed today, included nine deepwater, six shallow water and eight onland blocks.
While the deepwater and shallow blocks are located on east and west coast, the eight onland blocks are spread across areas in Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Nagaland, Rajasthan and Tripura.
Mr Naik said among the major discoveries under the NELP included the ones in the Krishna-Godavari Basin.
“Today, the KG area has become highly-prospective with a number of discoveries” he said.
Stating that the bidding was entirely transparent, he said the recent discoveries of oil and gas fields had vastly enhanced the prospects of hydro-carbon in India. “This is in contrast to the image earlier had by some companies which felt that prospects of oil discovery in India were low to moderate”, he said.
