Testing Norms of Gas Meter

The Minister of State (I/C) for Petroleum & Natural Gas Shri Dharmendra Pradhan informed the Lok Sabha in a written reply today that Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board (Technical Standards and Specifications including Safety Standards for City or Local Natural Gas Distribution Networks) Regulations 2008 mandate the City Gas Distribution companies to follow European Standard BS (British Standard) :1359/BS 4161 for Diaphragm gas meters.

Mahanagar Gas Limited (MGL) and Indraprastha Gas Limited (IGL) check the performance of gas meters installed at the residences of their consumers by installing a master meter in series with such gas meters.

The master meter used by MGL and IGL is calibrated and certified by M/s Fluid Control and Research Institute (FCRI), Pallakad, Kerala.

Gas meters installed by MGL are granted type approval by Government of India and conforms to the Legal Metrology Act 2009. These meters are calibrated by the manufacturers at their workplace. As per MGL, in developed nations e.g. UK, Canada and Massachusetts (USA) -

Model approval of meter is carried out by nodal agencies appointed by the Government.

Prototype of the meter is tested for performance, reliability and accuracy from accredited laboratories by the Manufacturer and the approval is submitted to Nodal agency for type approval.

After getting type approval, the manufacturer gets the meter stamped by the Government appointed agency to certify that it confirm to original pattern approval and accuracy. New meters are tested on sample basis.

MGL started commencement of City Gas Distribution operations in Mumbai in 1995 and has spread its network of Piped Natural Gas (PNG) and Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) supply in its authorised areas of Greater Mumbai, Mira-Bhayander, Thane City, Navi Mumbai, Kalyan, Dombivali, Ambernath, Badlapur, Ulhasnagar, Bhiwandi, Kharghar, Panvel and Taloja. To spread the convenience of safe, reliable and environment- friendly PNG and CNG, MGL is fast spreading its network to cater to the increasing demand.

Numbers of domestic connection provided by MGL in and around Mumbai in last three financial years and current financial year are given below:

FY 2012-13 (Nos.)	FY 2013-14 (Nos.)	FY 2014-15 (Nos.)	FY 2015-16 (till July’15) (Nos.)
83,070	64,744	95,095	23,260

MGL has informed that about 28,639 registered customers are pending for conversion as on August 2, 2015. The Government periodically reviews the progress of PNG coverage by CGD entities.

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Supply of Subsidised LPG Cylinders

The Minister of State (I/C) for Petroleum & Natural Gas Shri Dharmendra Pradhan informed the Lok Sabha in a written reply today that there is no proposal under consideration of the Government to reduce the current cap of 12 subsidized cylinders per domestic LPG connection per year.

Customers are provided with simpler modes of refill booking by Web/ SMS/ IVRS facility through which they can get tracking information of their booked refill at various stages, like booking confirmation, cash memo generation and delivery confirmation by SMS / e-mail. There is also a system in place of star rating of distributors based on the time taken to supply cylinder to consumer. This is also available in public domain in mylpg.in.

Further, for monitoring the supplies to the distributors, SMS indenting system has been introduced through which the LPG distributors can place their indents at the respective bottling plants. Supplies to the distributors are made as per their indents and the same is monitored on daily basis.

OMCs have reported that there is no restriction on refill booking by a customer. A Domestic LPG customer can book a refill any time provided no other refill booking is pending to be delivered to that consumer.

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Subsidy Sharing Mechanism

The Minister of State (I/C) for Petroleum & Natural Gas Shri Dharmendra Pradhan informed the Lok Sabha in a written reply today that at present, the Public Sector Oil Marketing Companies (OMCs) incur under-recovery on sale of PDS Kerosene and Subsidized Domestic LPG only. For the year 2015-16, the burden sharing mechanism is as under:

The Government has approved budgetary support for PDS Kerosene under-recovery at a rate of Rs. 12/Litre and the remaining under-recovery will be borne by the upstream companies.

The Government has approved a fixed subsidy of Rs. 18/kg under the Direct Benefit Transfer for Domestic LPG.

The details of cash assistance provided by the Government to OMCs in the first quarter of 2015-16 are as under:

(Rs. Crore)

	IOCL	BPCL	HPCL	Total
(i) PDS Kerosene
Cash assistance by the Government	1733	404	451	2588
(ii) Domestic LPG (DBTL)
Total DBTL subsidy for Apr-Jun’2015	2506	1155	1193	4854

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M.B. Lal Committee

The Minister of State (I/C) for Petroleum & Natural Gas Shri Dharmendra Pradhan informed the Lok Sabha in a written reply today that M.B.Lal Committee made 118 recommendations out of which 113 pertain to industry to be implemented by Oil Companies. Out of the 113, 110 recommendations have been implemented.

One of recommendations of the M.B.Lal Committee is to set up Emergency Response Centre (ERC) in the country. The recommendation was considered in consultation with representative of Oil Public Sector Undertakings and accordingly, a team consisting of two Members was deputed to Texas, USA in June, 2014 to gain first hand experience on ERC. The team visited the Refinery Terminal Fire Company (RTFC) & its facilities and submitted its report. Subsequently, a team of RTFC visited few oil installations and Mumbai Refinery in December, 2014. The RTFC submitted a Report, the salient features of which are hereunder:-

· ERC response time in India would depend upon distance, road & traffic conditions.

· Based on local conditions, the location of ERC facilities would be practical to target response time of not more than 2 hours.

· All assets/facilities to be divided into four geographical territories i.e. East, West, North & South. In each territory, a network of ERC centres should be connected to Crisis Management Dispatch/Information (CMD) Centre.

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Demand and Supply of Natural Gas

The Minister of State (I/C) for Petroleum & Natural Gas Shri Dharmendra Pradhan informed the Lok Sabha in a written reply today that the projection of natural gas production for the next three years are as under:

Year	ONGC (BCM)	OIL (BCM)	Pvt/JVs (BCM)
2015-16	22.49	3.010	8.36
2016-17	26.48	3.101	9.31
2017-18	31.65	3.201	11.45

BCM: Billion Cubic Metre

In order to enhance gas production, Government has taken/is taking a number of initiatives.

i. Enhance production from the existing field by adopting Improved Oil Recovery (IOR)/Enhanced Oil Recovery (EOR) measures using latest technology.

ii. Bring into production new discoveries at the earliest. For this a policy framework for early monetization of hydrocarbon discoveries under PSC regime has been approved by the Government.

This policy has addressed rigidities in the timelines of the PSC and has allowed the contractors to start production at the earliest.

iii. Facilitate enhanced exploration activities through following measures:

§ Appraisal of about 1.5 million sq km un-appraised area of the Indian Sedimentary Basins and acquisition of geo-scientific data under Multi client and non-exclusive policy.

§ Re-assessment of Hydrocarbon Resources.

§ Setting up of National Data Repository. Policy approved for exploration and exploitation of Shale Gas/Shale Oil resources by National oil Companies under the nomination regime.

§ Government approved the Policy on Testing Requirements for Discoveries in NELP blocks on 29.04.2015. The Policy would help in monetization of discoveries in five NELP blocks.

Normally, the use of natural gas is as a substitute fuel in the industries. Currently, in allocation of natural gas, Government has given priority to different sectors including Fertilizer & Power sector depending upon its availability. As far as encouraging the use of natural gas, it is to be decided by the industries based on the economies other competing fuels.

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Petroleum Minister Shri Dharmendra Pradhan launches the “Bio Fuel Blended HSD” on World Bio Fuel Day

The Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas (MoP&NG), India celebrated “World Bio Fuel Day” today. On this occasion, Ministry announced Marketing of High Speed Diesel blended with Bio-diesel in selected retail outlets of OMC’s in New Delhi & Vishakhapatnam (by HPCL), Haldia (by BPCL) and Vijayawada (by IOCL). Its a path breaking step in India’s retail sector for launching Bio-diesel B 5 blend to diesel consumers.

As a green initiative by MoP&NG, Bio-diesel blended HSD was launched by the Minister of State (I/C) for Petroleum & Natural Gas, Shri Dharmendra Pradhan at HPCL’s retail outlet in New Delhi. He also launched the sale of Bio-Diesel blended HSD in other cities through live streaming from Conference Hall of MoP&NG, Shastri Bhavan, New Delhi.

Recently, the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural gas has permitted direct sale of Bio-Diesel (B100) to bulk consumers like Railways, shipping and State Road Transport Corporations etc. Also, Ethanol Blended Petrol program (EBP) is being promoted, where ethanol blending in petrol is going from 5 to 10 % based on the availability of ethanol. Promoting and encouraging Biofuels will not only reduce the import of fossil fuel but also save foreign exchange and emphasise on “Make in India” mission. Biofuels are renewable, biodegradable, sustainable and environmental friendly. More importantly, these programmes will connect agrarian community with direct cash flow.

Internationally, 10th August is observed as "World Bio Diesel Day" in Germany and many other countries to mark the demonstration of Diesel Engine by Rudolf Diesel on various vegetable oils way back in 1893. In 1900 when he demonstrated the engine running on Ground nut oil in Paris he made a prophetic statement which reads like " My Engine today is running on Diesel but a day will come when all the fossil fuels be over, but my engine will continue to run".