Essar Oil Ltd., a subsidiary of Essar Energy Plc., has received environmental clearances from the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) for its coal bed methane (CBM) gas field at Raniganj in West Bengal.
The clearances will allow the company to increase drilling to 650 wells with full field development of the Raniganj block, excluding forest area. With environmental nod the company will enable to increase production to the targeted level of around 3 million standard cubic mtrs of gas per day, up from around 60,000 cubic mtrs currently.
The gas field is about 500 sq km block with total proven and probable reserves (2P), independently evaluated by consultants Netherland, Sewell and Associates Inc., of 113 billion cubic ft gross 3.2 billion cubic mtrs or 18.8 million barrels of oil equivalent.