Latest Gas Power News Aug'21

Latest Gas Power News from around the world focused on India:

1. Compressed Biogas: Indian Government is determined to increase natural gas component from current 6.5% to 15% in energy mix by 2030. It launched schemes like Sustainable Alternative Towards Affordable Transportation (SATAT) which envisages setting up 5,000 Compressed Bio-Gas (CBG) units across the country to produce 15 million tonnes of CBG by 2023.
2. LNG: India’s biggest LNG importer Petronet LNG is open to extending the existing long-term contract with Qatar’s RasGas beyond 2028 to secure uninterrupted supplies. Petronet LNG buys 7.5 million mt/year from RasGas via a long-term agreement and also imports 1.44 million mt/y from Exxon’s Gorgon project in Australia
3. Mining adverse effects: A seven-member high level Expert Technical Committee has been constituted to study the adverse impacts of hydrocarbon exploration and mining on groundwater and environment in Tamil Nadu, India
4. BHP to exit Oil & Gas: BHP will sell its oil and gas operations to Woodside Petroleum Ltd. in exchange for shares that it will distribute to its own investors. The company also approved US$5.7 billion of spending to build a massive new fertilizer mine in Canada
5. Gas Discovery: Jaya-1 (earlier Jambusar-Updip-1) is the third well drilled in Gujarat and the second hydrocarbon discovery notified by Vedanta under the OALP regime.
6. National Gas Grid: 15,369 km of pipelines are under various stages of construction at present. Taken together with the 17,126 km of existing pipelines, these would help create a basic national gas grid in India.
7. Gas Meter Manufacturing: Adani Total Gas bought 50 per cent in Smartmeters Technologies Pvt Ltd(SMTPL) for Rs 1 crore. The objective of the acquisition is “to manufacture gas meters with a focus on prepaid smart meters,” Adani Total Gas said.
8. Russia gas to Europe: Natural gas flows through the Yamal pipeline — a strategically important 2,000-kilometer pipeline that runs across four countries: Russia, Belarus, Poland and Germany — dropped to 20 million cubic meters per day in mid-August, according to ICIS. This was down from 49 mcm per day at the end of July, and a sharp fall from its typical rate of 81 mcm per day. Analysts have given political reasons for the same.
9. Reason for rising gas prices in US: The Federal Trade Commission, US is examining ways to crack down on mergers and acquisitions in the oil and gas industry and investigate whether gas station franchise networks are driving up gas prices as part of a Biden Administration effort to combat higher prices at the pump.
10. Urgent action to reduce Methane to avoid Climate Change:  According to the latest assessment report from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPPC), “Cutting methane is the biggest opportunity to slow warming between now and 2040″.
11. India’s New LNG Plant: Private firm Swan Energy starts its floating terminal next year, raising the country’s capacity to ship in the super chilled fuel by 12 per cent to 47.5 million tonnes p.a.
12. Gas increase followed by Coal: The elevated natural gas price levels could see the return of coal in the short-term. The U.S. Energy Information Administration said it expects the consumption of natural gas to decrease 1 per cent in 2021, largely due to less electricity generated from natural gas, while coal-related CO2 emissions will increase by 17 per cent as the share of U.S. electricity generated by coal has increased significantly this year.
13. Indian Oil JV with Petronas: Indian Oil is expanding its joint venture with Petronas to include building liquefied natural gas terminals, fuel retailing, as well as gas distribution, according to S.M. Vaidya, Chairman, Indian Oil.