Shell eyes ONGC's stagnating crude reserves

The company wants to provide its technology for extracting oil from old oil wells of ONGC in return for around 50 per cent share of the oil, reports Suman Layak.

Shell Global Solutions, the services arm of Shell, through its Indian arm Shell India Private Ltd is eyeing to tie up with ONGC Ltd on a technology for oil contract.

The company wants to provide its technology for extracting oil from old oil wells of ONGC in return for around 50 per cent share of the oil. The matter has been pending with the ONGC for sometime and no decision is likely till the company has a new chairman firmly in saddle.

Shell's Bart Van de Ven told Hindustan Times on Monday "We would rather enter into an agreement for sharing production than just providing technology. There are a lot of consultants who can provide technology. We would rather take a share of the oil."

ONGC right now has around 40 oil wells that are under the twin programmes of Improved Oil Recovery (IOR) and Enhanced Oil Recover (EOR). Of these, the company itself has started working on 16 wells to improve production.

ONGC sources said that the management under former chairman Subir Raha was not too keen to part with oil in return for technology and was prepared to pay a fee for the technology. However, the situation may change if a new chairman is brought in.

Shell on Monday announced that it has signed a contract with the Centre for High Technology to improve the efficiency of four major Indian refineries. These are Indian Oil's Mathura Refinery, Chennai Petroleum's Manali refinery, Hindustan Petroleum's Vizag refinery and Bharat Petroleum's Kochi Refinery.

These refineries currently account for 25 per cent of Indian consumption of petroleum products like petrol, aviation fuel and diesel.

Wind power talks on

Shell is also in talks with a number of Indian companies for setting up wind power plants in the country. The company is on the verge of starting off its first offshore wind power generating plant off the coast of The Netherlands.

Bart Van De Ven said: "We are talking to a lot of Indian companies. These are early days but we are looking for people with experience to partner in India."

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