RIL announces another discovery in KG basin

MUMBAI: Reliance Industries (RIL), India’s most valuable company, on Tuesday announced its third natural gas discovery this year. All three finds have been in the Krishna Godavari (KG) basin of India’s eastern coast. The commercial potential of the discovery, in the block known as KG-D3, was being evaluated by gathering more data, RIL said in a statement. RIL holds a 90% equity stake in the block, which covers an area of 3,288 sq km, while UK-based Hardy Oil holds the rest.

The RIL stock closed flat at Rs 1018.80 on BSE. RIL had reportedly found natural gas in the KG-D3 block on two earlier occasions, in February and April, and plans to drill three more wells in the field, it said in the statement.

Earlier, there has been some controversy over the exact quantum of natural gas in the block. Hardy Oil had said in May this year that potential resources in the KG-D3 field might be as much as 9.5 trillion cubic feet, almost on a par with the 10.03-trillion cubic feet of recoverable reserves in the famous KG-D6 block, the largest discovery of natural gas in India and the subject of two court battles, one between RIL and public sector company NTPC and the other between RIL and the Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group company Reliance Natural Resources.

However, Hardy was pulled up for its statement by the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons, or DGH, which regulates oil exploration and production in India, as it had not confirmed these finds. The British company was let off with a warning after it promised not to make such statements in future.

The latest discovery, which the company has named ‘Dhirubhai – 44’ has been notified to the government and the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons, the statement added.

RIL plans to produce 80 million cubic meters of gas from KG-D6 by next year and double India’s output of the cleaner burning fuel.