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Oil India Ltd, the nation's second biggest state-owned explorer, has roped in French energy giant TotalEnergies to provide technical assistance in finding oil and natural gas reserves in deep and ultra-deepwater areas. "OIL and TotalEnergies inked a technology service agreement on November 19, 2025 in New Delhi to strengthen strategic collaboration for exploration activities in deep and ultra-deepwater offshore frontiers of Indian sedimentary Basins, including the stratigraphic wells as mandated by the government of India," OIL said in a statement on Wednesday. The agreement puts in place a framework to leverage TotalEnergies' expertise in deep and ultra-deepwater exploration value chain across OIL's current and future offshore portfolio. It includes the ongoing appraisal programme of gas find in the shallow offshore blocks in Andaman basin as well as exploration in OIL's ultradeep water blocks in Mahanadi and Krishna Godavari Basins. It also covers evaluation of opportunities under
State-run oil explorers ONGC and Oil India Ltd are planning to begin a Rs 3,200 crore stratigraphic drilling campaign in untapped offshore areas early next year, as part of efforts to discover new hydrocarbon reserves and cut reliance on imports, officials said. In the first phase, four wells will be drilled in deepsea of Andaman, Mahanadi, Saurashtra and Bengal sedimentary basins. Global energy giant BP will provide technical expertise in identifying the locations as well as drilling, officials said. Stratigraphic drilling - also known as a stratigraphic test well - is a type of exploratory drilling aimed at studying underground geological formations rather than producing oil or gas. These wells are drilled to gather data on subsurface layers through continuous coring, petrophysical logging, and seismic data integration. The objective is to build a detailed geological profile to support future hydrocarbon exploration, without any immediate intent to extract resources. This will he
Hindustan Copper Ltd (HCL) on Friday entered into an initial pact with Oil India Ltd for cooperation on exploration and development of critical and strategic minerals, including copper. The development comes at a time when the country is prioritising domestic production to reduce import dependency on China. State-owned Oil India Ltd (OIL) has a proven expertise in exploration, development, production and transportation of crude oil and natural gas. "In a significant step towards strengthening India's self-reliance in critical and strategic mineral sourcing, Oil India Ltd and Hindustan Copper Ltd signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on September 19, 2025," HCL said in a statement. HCL, a PSU under the mines ministry, is engaged in mining, production, processing and marketing of copper and related products. It is focusing on mining and beneficiation of copper ore and selling of copper concentrate. Hindustan Copper had earlier told PTI that it plans to bid for critical mineral