ONGC, OIL can fix price of natural gas

NEW DELHI: In a significant development, the government has given national oil firms ONGC and OIL freedom to price any additional natural gas produced from blocks given to them on nomination basis at market rates. So far, all gas — current and future — produced from blocks given to Oil and Natural Gas Corp (ONGC) and Oil India Ltd (OIL) was priced at government-controlled rates, called APM. The Petroleum Ministry, in an order dated May 31, has now made a distinction between existing producing fields and new ones in the nomination blocks. “ONGC and OIL would have the freedom to sell any productionfrom new fields in their nominated blocks at non-APM rates,” the ordersaid. Even the price of APM gas from June 1 has been more thandoubled to $4.2 per million British thermal units, at par with the rate at whichRIL sells gas from its eastern offshore KG-D6 fields.