West Bengal finds a place on the Oil and Gas map of the world

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Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) opened India’s eighth hydrocarbon producing basin on 20th December, 2020 from the well in Asokenagar-1 in 24 Pargana district, 50 Km away from Kolkata.

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• West Bengal gets incorporated in ONGC’s Oil and gas map with its eighth field at Ashoknagar in West Bengal, whose commercial production started on 20th December, 2020.
• 13 more wells will be dug by ONGC in coming three years in the newly awarded acreages under the open acreage licensing policy.
• ONGC has largest share in (72%) oil and gas production in India.
• This discovery is the result of around seven decades of relentless endeavors by scientists and engineers of India, giving a new hope for vigorous development of West Bengal. ONGC dug 150 wells to find oil and natural gas in Bengal but first exploration happened in Ashoknagar on 3.5 acres.
• This will empower the people by bringing more employment and thus bringing prosperity to the state.
• It would play an important role in India’s energy security.
• First consignment from Asokenagar-1 well was sent to Indian Oil Corporation Limited (IOC) Haldia refinery on November 5, 2020.
• Ashoknagar oil fields will produce gas to the amount of 1 lakh cubic meters a day and oil between 15-18 cubic meters (1 cubic meter equals to 1,000 litres) a day.
• ONGC has started fresh geoscientific activities that comprises of appraisal programme of Asokenagar discovery for an area of about 739 square kilometers including 3D seismic, low frequency passive seismic (LFPS) survey and drilling of two wells.
• Also ONGC will bring in about 1,300 line km of 2D, 2,900 sq km of 3D and drill 13 wells in the next three years in the newly rewarded Open Acreage Licensing Policy (OALP) acreages.
• ONGC and Oil India did exploration in 2009 in Bengal basin that got over in 2014. But huge reserve of oil and natural gas with commercial exploitability was confirmed in August, 2018.

Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC)

ONGC is the largest energy company of India. ONGC was established in the form of Oil and Gas division, under Geological Survey of India, in 1955. In 1994, Oil and Natural Gas Commission was converted in to a Corporation, and in 1997 it was granted the status of one of the Navratnas by the Government of India. Subsequently, it was conferred with Maharatna status in the year 2010.

Crude oil is the raw material used by downstream companies like IOC, BPCL, and HPCL (subsidiary of ONGC) to produce petroleum products like Petrol, Diesel, Kerosene, Naphtha, and Cooking Gas-LPG. Global rank of the company is 11th. It is the only public sector Indian company to feature in Fortune’s ‘Most Admired Energy Companies’ list.