ONGC strikes 'significant' oil, gas in KG basin

State-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) on Wednesday said it has made another significant oil and gas discovery in its Krishna Godavari basin deepwater block KG-D5, which sits next to Reliance Industries' flaging KG-D6 area.

Well M-4, drilled 25 km off the nearest coastline, "encountered six hydrocarbon bearing zones with net pay of 78 meters have been established," the company said in a statement. During testing, the well flowed oil at a rate of about 3,160 barrels per day and gas at a rate of about 3.19 lakh cubic meters a day.

"The discovery has enhanced the value of the block KG-DWN-98/2 and has opened up further area for exploration and appraisal," it said.

ONGC had previously made 11 oil and gas discoveries in KG-D5 block which it is targeting to start producing from in 2018-19.

The discovery in KG-D5 block is besides the four new finds it has notified in the fourth quarter of 2014-15 ended March 31.

The firm said in all it made 22 discoveries in 2014-15 and another two, including the one in KG-D5, in current fiscal. Giving details of the discoveries made in the last quarter of 2014-15, ONGC said it struck oil in Gujarat onland block CB-ONN-2004/2 near the town of Nadiad and an oil and gas discovery near Amlapuram in East Godavari district of Andhra Pradesh.

Besides, two gas find was made in Golaghat district of Assam. ONGC said this fiscal it has also made a gas discovery in KG offshore block KG-OSN-2004/1.

The well NASG-1 located about 19 km south of nearest coastal temple town of Antarvedi in Andhra Pradesh, was drilled down to a depth of 2555 meters and encountered net pay of 25 meters.

"This is the sixth discovery in the block KG-OSN-2004/1 and will add economic value to the development plan being formulated," ONGC said.

ONGC said the estimated accretion to in-place hydrocarbons from its operated areas in India in 2014-15 stands at 215.65 million tonne of oil and oil equivalent gas.

Out of this, oil is 91.87 million tonne and the rest is natural gas. During 2014-15, ONGC produced 22.264 million tons of crude oil as against 22.247 million tons in the year before.

"Thus continuous decline in production of crude oil over last seven years could be stopped," the statement said.

The growth in production has come from ONGC's western offshore fields which saw a 7.5 per cent rise to 14.74 million tons.