India looks for fresh oil sources overseas

Minister of petroleum and natural gas M Veerappa Moily has been holding bilateral meetings with visiting ministerial delegations from various countries like Libya, UAE, Bahrain and the Canadian province of Alberta, in a bid to  expand cooperation with other countries in the oil and gas sector. 

The latest, held on the sidelines of Petrotech 2014 at Greater Noida in Delhi on Monday, discussed enhanced cooperation in the hydrocarbon sector.

In his meeting with Libyan minister of oil and gas Abdulbari A Arousi, the two ministers agrred on the need for increasing crude oil to supplies to India and cooperation in the field of upstream projects. In this context, Bharat Petroleum Corporation has urged the revival of the term contract for supply of crude oil to India.

ONGC Videsh (OVL) has proposed the signing of a memorandum of understanding to provide institutional framework for exploring specific projects for cooperation.

The Libyan minister has assured to consider these and emphasised that Libya was keen to increase cooperation with India.

Moily and Suhail Mohhamed Al Mazrouei, minister of energy of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) discussed a proposal for cooperation between OVL and Mubadala, an investment and development company of UAE, to jointly invest the upstream projects in third countries.

The visiting minister showed keen interest in the proposal and asked that both the companies should soon meet to arrive at specific focus countries. He also said that Indian companies may participate in the future exploration and production opportunities and pointed out the UAE is looking for raising rate of recovery from existing fields.

Moily also discussed greater role for Engineers India Ltd (EIL) in the development of UAE's oil sector.

India also invited UAE investments in HPCL's upcoming refinery-cum petrochemical projects in Rajasthan and Andhra Pradesh.

In the bilateral meeting between Indian petroleum minister and Shaikh Ahmed bin Mohammed Al Kahlifa, minister of finance and in-charge of National Oil and Gas Authority of Bahrain, the two leaders agreed that cooperation in the oil and gas sector should be further enhanced.

India showed keen interest in sourcing more crude oil from Bahrain while investors from that country could also look for investment in India and Indian oil companies could look to Bahrain for investments along hydrocarbon value chain.

Moily and visiting premier of Alberta, Canada, Alison M Redford discussed various areas of cooperation between India and Alberta. She said Alberta was keen about investments by Indian oil companies and offered expertise in the area of shale gas.