Essar to begin Raniganj gas supply from July .............

Pratim Ranjan Bose
Kolkata, June 27
Essar Exploration and Production Ltd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Essar Oil, hopes to start its first gas supply from the Ranigunj (East) CBM block beginning next month.
The initial supplies of 5,000 standard cubic metre a day (scmd) will be to a medium-scale industrial consumer in Durgapur through cascades.
The company's present agreement is with the RPG Group's Phillips Carbon Black Ltd (PCBL) for meeting the requirement of its Durgapur factory. The volume of supply is 60,000 scmd. PCBL is expected to part replace the liquid feedstock CBFS (carbon black feed stock) with gas.
Essar has also entered in a long term contract for sale of 2.8 million metric standard cubic metre (mmscmd) to Matix Fertilisers and Chemicals for its proposed gas-based fertiliser facility.


Below target
According to sources, Essar is currently producing 16,000 scmd of gas from 15 wells at the field located close to Durgapur. The production falls short of its target of one lakh scmd (0.1 mmscmd) from the field, located 150 km away from here, by March 2010.
Sources said that unexpected increase in water flow into the wells was the prime reason behind the less than targeted production of gas. Unlike oil and natural gas reserves, CBM reserves are of low pressure and needs water to be pumped out to let gas come up. The duration of this ‘de-watering' or stabilising the production varies between the reserves. “Understandably the water content is now coming down and production from the existing wells would rise,” a source added.
Meanwhile, the company plans to drill 160 wells a year to take the total number of wells in Ranigunj (East) to over 300 by the end of 2011-12. A total of seven rigs or drills are currently pressed into service. Ten new wells have already been added to the tally.
Essar has exploration rights in four new blocks in the last CBM Policy round, taking its total tally of CBM exploration acreages to five. Additionally, the company has been awaiting the Centre's approval for CBM exploration rights in its oil and gas field of Mehsana in Gujarat for quite a few years now.
Among the new blocks own, Sohagpur in Madhya Pradesh is considered the most promising. The others include Rajmahal, IB Valley and Talcher. Of these, Rajmahal block in Jharkhand is located closer to the Ranigunj (East).

My Comments:
No wonder punters are giving targets of 200 in ST......looking at the above news, Essar Oil is starting Gas supply next month, this is an obvious 1st target.....and long way to go.....