By Nidhi Verma
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Oil and gas will continue to meet the ‘baseload’ energy demand of India in “foreseeable future” even as the world’s third biggest crude importer takes steps to move to cleaner sources to cut emissions, oil minister Hardeep Sing Puri said on Friday.
India has set a goal to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2070.
“As our economy grows to $5 trillion by 2025, and towards $10 trillion by 2030, our burgeoning energy needs will take shape and in turn, the global energy markets will be shaped by India’s requirements,” Puri told the World Energy Policy Summit.
Imports cover about 85% of India’s overall crude needs, but its per capita energy consumption is just a third of the global average.
Hit hard by a rally in global oil prices, India is taking steps to boost its oil and gas output while accelerating energy transmission to cut emissions.
However, Puri said “the oil and gas will continue to meet the baseload energy demand for the foreseeable future” .
India’s top oil explorer Oil and Natural Gas Corp is scouting for partnerships with global companies to boost oil and gas output, its chairperson Alka Mittal said at the online event.
ExxonMobil Gas (India) chief executive Monte Dobson said his company would help ONGC in boosting oil, gas output from ONGC’s difficult and challenging fields in India’s east and west coasts.
India Oil Corp, the country’s top refiner, is expanding into low carbon businesses, by expanding its gas sales business and building infrastructure to help boost the role of electric vehicles in India’s transport fleet.
“IOC is leveraging the surplus hydrogen capacities available at its refineries as a potential source for promoting fuel cell mobility,” its chairman S.M. Vaidya said.
(Reporting by Nidhi Verma; Editing by Tomasz Janowski)
