India Launches Gas Trading Exchange

(UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News / WAM - 15th Jun, 2020) From Krishnan Nayar NEW DELHI, 15th June, 2020 (WAM) – India’s Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas, Dharmendra Pradhan, today launched the country’s first across-the-board online delivery-based gas trading platform, the Indian Gas Exchange, IGX.

It will enable foreign companies, including gas exporters in the Gulf, to sell directly to domestic customers here. Indian gas companies will also be allowed to do so.

India plans to increase by two and a half times the share of gas in its energy consumption pattern in 10 years. Currently, India’s daily consumption of gas is estimated to be approximately 165 million cubic metres.

Nearly half of this comes from imported liquefied natural gas, LNG, which makes the role of LNG-exporting countries and companies critical to the newly launched IGX.

Pradhan said the launch of IGX, as an electronic trading platform for natural gas, had opened a new chapter in the energy history of India to help the country move towards free market pricing of natural gas, according to a readout of the launch by the government’s Press Information Bureau.

He promised to soon unveil a new gas tariff policy, nearly double India’s gas pipeline infrastructure and increase the annual LNG import capacity by 26 per cent.