India's crude oil production fell around 3.6 percent in July on lower output from fields operated by state-owned ONGC and private sector firms, government data released on Tuesday showed. Production of crude oil, which is refined to produce fuels such as petrol and diesel, fell to 2.45 million tonne in July from 2.54 million tonne a year ago.
The output was lower than the monthly target of 2.59 million tonne, the data released by the Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas showed. Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) produced 1.7 percent less oil at 1.63 million tonnes on lower output from western offshore. Fields operated by private firms saw a 12.34 percent decline in production.
But the oil production during the first four months of the current fiscal that began on April 1 was only marginally lower at 9.91 million tonne as opposed to 9.96 million tonne during April-July 2021. Oil Minister Hardeep Singh Puri on August 4 had tweeted that the declining trend in crude oil production has been reversed.
"We have already been able to reverse the declining trend in oil production from 2011-12 with an expected 29.7 million tonnes in 2021-22 to 30.8 million tonnes in 2022-23 & 34 million tonnes (estimated) in 2023-24, and are confident of rapidly ramping up the nation's oil production in the years to come," he had said.
According to the Ministry data, ONGC's oilfields in Gujarat and Assam produced less oil while Vedanta's Rajasthan block had a lower output.
Natural gas output was almost unchanged at 2.88 billion cubic metre (bcm) in July but was 3.4 percent higher during April-July at 11.43 bcm, according to the data released Tuesday. ONGC's gas output was almost 4 percent lower in July due to less gas production in the Daman field in Mumbai offshore.
The country's 22 oil refineries processed 10.52 percent more crude oil at 21.43 million tonne as demand for fuel picked up. Domestically produced crude oil forms just 15 percent of the processing at refineries, the rest being imported oil.
Refineries operated at over 100 percent of their rated capacity in July, up from 91.58 percent in the same month last year. With 83.96 million tonne crude oil processed, refineries operated at 103.87 percent of their capacity during April-July as compared to an operating rate of 92.01 percent in processing 76.64 million tonne of crude oil.
Refineries produced 6.23 percent more fuel in July at 21.97 million tonne and 11.67 percent more fuel during April-July at 90 million tonne.
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