INDIA’s Petronet has shown interest in buying liquefied natural gas (LNG) from the proposed LNG project in the country, Dow Jones Newswire has reported.
The report quoted an unnamed source, saying that India’s state-owned Petronet is currently in discussion with the Papua New Guinea LNG development partner and operator Exxon Mobil to buy gas from the proposed project.
The source, someone who is familiar with the current negotiations between Petronet and Exxon Mobil, could not provide the quantity Petronet may be interested in, saying “it is too early to talk about quantities”.
The energy company is expanding the capacity of Dajeh terminal in India to 10 million metric tonnes by the end of the year, looking at feeding the terminal with gas from PNG, the newswire report said.
Gas-dependant India imports 25% of gas to meet domestic demand.
The proposed PNG LNG project is likely to enter the front end engineering and eesign (FEED) stage next month once project development partners led by Exxon Mobil and Oil Search finalise gas pricing issues with the PNG Government.
If all objectives are met, construction of the LNG project is likely to take place next year, with gas sales to take place in 2013.