States told not to jeopardize future investments

India’s growing energy sector is attractive for foreign investors and has repeatedly received funding from Sovereign Wealth Funds, Pension Funds, long-term strategic investors from Western countries, Asian Countries and the Middle East.

Stating this, Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said: “Many companies have successfully raised funding through overseas bond market and this funding route is likely to grow manifold going forward,”

But the Minister was mindful of the difficulties being faced by investors in some instances where a State Government is trying to renegotiate some of the executed contracts.

“Our Government has requested State Governments to reconsider their decision, as this will jeopardize future investment in not only the concerned state but also the country as a whole,” he said as an assurance.

Pradhan addressed the Bloomberg NEF New Delhi Summit on 2 August 2019 where he underlined the potential of attracting more funding based on the projected Indian economic growth of over 7% a year.

The Minister said that India’s upstream sector is an important focus area of the government.

Several transformative policy reforms have been undertaken to revitalize the E&P eco-system and establish a conducive business environment, which would facilitate more investment and boost domestic oil & gas production.

“The key policy reforms undertaken to augment the domestic oil and gas production include the policy of uniform licensing, marketing and pricing freedom to the operators, availability of comprehensive data to the investors to take informed decisions and fiscal incentives with the thrust on production enhancement,” Pradhan said in a PIB release on 2 Aug 2019.

India, he said, will become US$3 trillion economy this year and aims to achieve a US$5 trillion target in the near future.

But to achieve this target, India needs secure, affordable and sustainable energy to sustain the high growth and provide energy access to 1.3 billion people.

“Therefore, it is important for us to tap every source of energy. “We have taken several measures to overhaul the hydrocarbon sector to ensure energy security for the country while pursuing a green path to progress.”, the Minister said.

On the issue of energy landscape, Pradhan said that it is passing through a big change – making way for clean energy technologies.

“In a drive to provide energy access to all in a sustainable manner, our Government has taken a big responsibility by making global commitment to reduce emissions intensity of its GDP by 33%–35% from 2005 levels.

“One of the main strategies India is planning to adopt towards achieving this goal is by having 40% electricity generation capacity from non-fossil fuel-based energy resources by 2030,” Pradhan stressed.

He appreciated oil and gas companies’ investment in developing renewable energy projects for self-consumption and for supplying to the grid.

He also noted that oil Marketing Companies are providing soft loans and subsidies to petrol pump dealers to install solar rooftops.

“This is the right time to think of sale options like blending electricity generated from gas power plants with renewable energy. This will further aid the process of emission reduction.”

The Minister also appreciated that many of the refineries, located close to large urban clusters, have shifted to cleaner natural gas for their energy needs as good corporate citizens.

In addition, the government has already implemented fuel efficiency norms for commercial heavy vehicles.

“To tackle pollution issues, we are looking at gas-based transportation solutions. We are switching to BS-VI fuels from 1st April 2020.

“The National Capital Territory of Delhi has already switched to BS-VI fuels in April last year. We are promoting the use of CNG, bio-CNG and LNG in transportation sector,” he underlined.

India is setting up bio-refineries and targeting newer sources of ethanol. The ethanol-blended program will enable OMCs to sell 10% blended petrol,” Pradhan said.

On the biodiesel programme, the Minister said: “I am confident that we will soon be rolling out initiatives to enable achievement of 5% biodiesel blended diesel across country”.

“We will promote EVs, but it will be a holistic and integrated planning, where I have mentioned in my recent statements that all forms of transportation, which are clean and affordable, will be considered in our Energy Policy.” fiinews.com