ONGC to invest Rs 4,051 cr in Mumbai High field infra revamp

State-owned Oil & Natural Gas Corporation said on Thursday it will invest over Rs 4,051 crore (Rs 40.51 billion) in revamping infrastructure at its key oil and gas fields off the Mumbai coast.

The company also said it has made three oil and gas discoveries in Krishna Godavari basin and Tripura.

ONGC said it will invest Rs 2,913.10 crore (Rs 29.13 billion) in revamping 48 ageing platforms at Mumbai High and Neelam & Heera oil and gas fields.

After the recent redevelopment efforts, these fields are expected to be in production till at least 2030 but the existing infrastructural facilities will not last that long.

"Hence revamping/retrofitting of these facilities in a phased manner is essential to maintain the production of oil and gas from Mumbai High and Heera fields," ONGC said in a statement.

The company board in its meeting yesterday approved revamp of 48 platform on these fields by mid of 2016.

Also, the board approved Rs 1,138.50 crore (Rs 11.38 billion) revamp of BPA and BPB process complexes on the giant Bassein & Satellite gas fields in the western offshore.

The two process complexes, which handle and process acidic and corrosive gas before the fuel is dispatched to Hazira Gas processing plant of ONGC, were commissioned in 1987 and 1989 respectively.

"Both the complexes have already covered the normal design life of 25

years," ONGC said.

"As per prevailing Refurbishment Policy based on recommendations of statutory bodies, it is proposed to carry out revamping for various static equipment and pipelines of these two complexes."

While the revamping job of BPB is planned to be completed in 2013-14, the same for BPA is scheduled for completion in 2014-15.

ONGC said it has made an oil discovery in a KG basin block in Andhra Pradesh. Exploratory well Vanaduru South-1 in West Godavari block of KG Onland Basin, 8 km north-west of Bantumillli town of West Godavari district in Andhra Pradesh found very high quality oil.

In shallow waters of KG basin, its exploratory well Saveri-1 in NELP block KG-OSN-2004 flowed gas and condensate.

"This high potential discovery augments the hydrocarbon volumes established through two earlier discoveries namely Chandrika South and Alankari in the block and is a significant boost to ONGC's efforts towards attaining critical hydrocarbon volumes for viability of a possible 'cluster based development' for the block," the statement said.

In Tripura, gas was discovered in an exploratory well AD-37, 12 km south-west of Agartala in Tripura.

"This discovery results in consolidation of play met in earlier discovery in AD-30 well and opens western flank of Agartala Dome up to Konaban for further exploration," ONGC added.