Allocation of gas to 12th Plan projects-II: Category-wise reservations not feasible, says MoPNG

Arguing against the power ministry's proposal for reserving fixed proportions of gas extracted from all new finds for various categories of power plants, the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MoPNG) has asked the former to revisit this aspect of the criteria put forward for gas allocation to power plants that are scheduled for commissioning during the 12th Plan period. 

• The Ministry of Power (MoP) had called for 4% of all new gas finds to go towards power plants being set up in SEZs, with 4% going to DMICDC, 5% for peaking power plants and 5% for captive power plants
• According to MoPNG, most new discoveries in India are scattered, and additional gas may also be sourced from CBM resources. As such, such stark reservations would be difficult to implements since individual shares would have to be stored and transported separately to the respective end-use units.
• In view of these factors, the ministry has asked MoP to workout a means to divert gas to other projects, in case the earmarks cannot be feasibly utilized within a designated category.