Exploring the Natural Gas Landscape in India

This paper considers the growing importance of natural gas in India’s energy landscape. India, like other developing economies, faces enormous challenges in providing a source of energy that is secure, affordable, transportable, and relatively clean for sustained economic growth while moving towards a carbon neutral society. Natural gas has been identified by the government as one part of that solution. We focus our non-comprehensive review on three primary end uses of natural gas in India: city gas distribution (including household and transport), power generation, and industry (e.g., fertilizers, steel, refinery, petrochemicals). The allocation of domestically sourced natural gas for end-use sectors depends on central government policy guidelines. Also, less regulatory restriction is applied for imported gas, and the market can freely import liquefied natural gas. This review lays the groundwork for more detailed analysis, and for identifying tradeoffs between the use of natural gas versus other forms of energy for power and other sectors in the Indian context.