India's Petronet LNG has signed a preliminary deal with Russia's Gazprom for the supply of 2.5 million mt/year LNG for 25 years, managing director A K Balyan said by telephone from New Delhi, Wednesday.
However, the price, volume and delivery details would be negotiated with Gazprom next month, Balyan said, without elaborating.
Petronet LNG plans to seek the long-term supply for its exiting LNG import and regasification terminal at Dahej in Gujarat on the west coast, and also at its upcoming terminal at Kochi in southern India, again on the west coast.
With increasing demand for regasified LNG due to a drop in domestic natural gas production, especially from Reliance Industries' eastern offshore KG-D6 block, Petronet LNG is also looking at short-term LNG cargoes from Gazprom and other suppliers.
"We hope to operate our terminal almost at full capacity this year," Balyan said. Petronet LNG's import and regasification terminal at Dahej has a nameplate capacity of 10 million mt/year and can process up to 11.5 million mt/year of LNG.
In April, the company said it had concluded short-term contracts for an additional 1.5 million mt/year of LNG for the 2011-12 and 2012-13 fiscal years (April-March) from various sources and has also sold this volume.
Petronet LNG which has a long-term contract with Qatar's RasGas for the supply of 7.5 million mt/year.
The company is also building a 5 million mt/year import and regasification terminal on the country's west coast in Kerala expected to be commissioned by the third quarter of fiscal 2012-13.
The company has a 20-year supply contract with the Gorgon LNG project in Western Australia for 1.5 million mt/year of LNG for the Kochi terminal.
The major shareholders in Petronet are state-owned GAIL, Oil and Natural Gas Corp.., Indian Oil Corp. and Bharat Petroleum Corp., each with 12.5%.
France's GDF holds a 10% stake and the Asian Development Bank 5.25%, with the public holding the remainder.
