New Delhi, pti: Dec 15, 2013
Reliance Industries has lodged a strong protest against a government move to snatch away an area containing five gas discoveries, saying the decision was a breach of contract.
The Oil Ministry had on October 28 ordered RIL to surrender 6,198.88 square kilometres of a 7,645 sq km area in its eastern offshore KG-D6 block, 15 per cent more than the 5,367 sq km the company had voluntarily offered to relinquish.
The excess area being taken away holds five discoveries — D-4, D-7, D-8, D-16 and D-23 — with 0.805 trillion cubic feet of gas reserves, or about one-fourth of the restated reserves in the producing Dhirubhai 1 and 3 (D1&D3) fields in the KG-D6 block, and is worth USD 10 billion.
RIL President & COO B Ganguly on November 11 wrote to the Oil Ministry, expressing surprise at the order when the field development plan (FDP) and the application for issuance of the petroleum mining lease for the five discoveries was under consideration of the government.
The five discoveries, he wrote, are non-associated natural gas find, which under the Production Sharing Contract, the company was entitled to retain as a discovery area.
Stating that all timelines prescribed in the PSC were followed, he said that RIL submitted the proposal to declare the finds commercial within the stipulated three years and a FDP for the five finds along with four others on July 14, 2008, within the prescribed one year.
RIL said the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons (DGH) communicated that the discoveries are unviable at the current price of $4.2 only on March 31, 2009, as against the PSC stipulated timeline of deciding the issue within 180 days from the submission and 90 days from receipt of additional information.
via Business - Google News http://news.google.com/news/url?sa=t&fd=R&usg=AFQjCNH9_9dH5VDFMb8g9rKofoXK5z7slg&url=http://www.deccanherald.com/content/374746/ril-protests-against-govt-move.html
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