Videocon, BPCL will bring LNG from Mozambique

Videocon Industries and Bharat Petroleum Corporation (BPCL) today said the natural gas discovery they made off Mozambique may hold 15-30 trillion cubic feet (tcf) of inplace reserves which they may ship into India in form of LNG.

The Barquentine-3 appraisal well on the Area-1 in Rovuma basin off Mozambique encountered more than 202 net metres of natural gas pay, the companies said in identical statements.

"This significantly expands the estimated recovery resource range to 15 to 30-plus tcf of natural gas," they said.

Barquentinue-3 is the sixth successful well in the block that includes the Windjammer, Lagosta, Barquentine and Camarao discoveries. The Barquentine-3 appraisal well, which was drilled to a total depth of 4,084-km in water depths of 1,575 metres, is located 4.4-km southeast of the Barquentine discovery.

"The operator (US-based Anadarko Petroleum Corp) also informed that the recoverable resources of this size and quality are suited for a large-scale LNG development, which is currently being designed for at least two trains with the flexibility to expand to six trains," the statements said.

"The pre-FEED (front-end engineering and design) activity for the LNG development is nearing completion and FEED work is expected to bring in the near future," the statements said.

Bharat PetroResources, a wholly-owned subsidiary of BPCL, and Videocon Hydrocarbon Holdings, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Videocon Industries, hold 10% stake each in Area-1.

Anadarko, which holds 36.5% interest in the block, plans to put up plants to liquify the gas (liquefied natural gas or LNG) so that it can be shipped to consumption centres in cyrogenic ships. The two LNG trains will have a capacity to produce 5 million tonnes of liquid fuel each.

The reserves are more than 11 tcf of resource in Reliance Industries' eastern offshore KG-D6 fields. Reliance had last year produced over 61 million standard cubic meters per day from its KG-D6 gas discoveries before technical problems led to drop in output. The output is enough to produce about 15 million tonnes of LNG per annum.

Anadarko, which is moving Belford Dolphin drilling rig to Barquentine-4 appraisal well site, is mobilising a second deepwater drillship, Deepwater Milenium, to accelerate the campaign comprising an extensive reservoir testing programme.

Cove Energy Mozambique Rovuma Offshore holds 8.5% interest in the block and Mitsui E&P Miozambique another 20%. The balance 15% is with Empressa Nacional de Hidrocarbonetos (EIH), the national oil company of Mozambique.