Pradhan leads delegation for TAPI Steering Committee meet

Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan along with a high-level delegation today left for Ashgabat, Turkmenistan, to attend the 22nd Steering Committee meet on the USD 7.6-billion TAPI gas pipeline project.
Work on Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline project is yet to commence as the four nations to the project have so far not succeeded in finding a reputable international firm that could lead the consortium that will construct and operate the 1,800-km long pipeline.
"India remains committed to play its rightful role with responsibility in implementing the over 1,800-km gas pipeline which is expected to deliver natural gas to the tune of 38 million standard cubic meters per day at India's western border, thereby enhancing the nation's energy security," an official statement said here.

Pradhan is accompanied by a high-level delegation including senior officials of the Ministry of Petroleum and Natuarl Gas, Ministry of External Affairs besides gas utility GAIL India chairman B C Tripathi and ONGC Videsh Ltd Managing Director N K Verma, it said.
New Delhi is pressing Turkmenistan to relax its domestic law to help get an international firm for building the project.
TAPI project has remained on the drawing board since the four nations have not been able to get an international firm to head a consortium, which will lay and operate the pipeline.

French giant Total SA had initially envisaged interest in leading a consortium of national oil companies of the four nations in the TAPI project. However, it backed off after Turkmenistan refused to accept its condition of a stake in the gas field that will feed the pipeline.

Since the four state-owned firms, including GAIL of India, neither have the financial muscle nor the experience of cross-country line, an international company that will build and also operate the line in hostile territories of Afghanistan and Pakistan, is needed.
The TAPI pipeline will have a capacity to carry 90 million standard cubic metres a day (mmscmd) gas for a 30-year period and will be operational in 2018. India and Pakistan would get 38 mmscmd each, while the remaining 14 mmscmd will be supplied to Afghanistan.
TAPI will carry gas from Turkmenistan's Galkynysh field, better known by its previous name South Yoiotan Osman that holds gas reserves of 16 trillion cubic feet.

From the field, the pipeline will run to Herat and Kandahar province of Afghanistan, before entering Pakistan. In Pakistan, it will reach Multan via Quetta before ending at Fazilka (Punjab) in India.