Cotext: While addressing a petroleum university's convocation, PM of India said that work is being done to nearly double the country's oil refining capacity in the next five years.
Key highlights of the announcement

• It was announced that India’s oil refining capacity could jump to 450-500 million tonnes in 10 years from the current level of about 250 million tonnes earlier. But now, it will be achieved in the next five years.
• Natural Gas currently accounts for about 6% of the energy consumed in the country.
• India would achieve its targets of increasing renewable energy capacity to 175 gigawatts by 2022 and 450 gigawatts by 2030 ahead of schedule.
• The country had renewable energy capacity of about 75 gigawatts at the end of 2018.

Key Facts on Oil Refining and Natural Gas

• Oil and gas sector is among the eight core industries in India.
• The government has allowed 100% Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in many segments of the sector, including natural gas, petroleum products and refineries among others.
• India has been the fourth-largest Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) importer since 2011 after Japan, South Korea, and China.
• As of August 01, 2020, India’s oil refining capacity stood at 249.9 million metric tonnes (MMT), making it the second-largest refiner in Asia.
• Private companies own about 35.29% of the total refining capacity in FY20.
• The petroleum and natural gas sector attracted FDI worth US$ 7.82 billion between April 2000 and March 2020.
• The energy trade between India and US is likely to touch US$ 10 billion in FY20.
• The Oil Ministry plans to set up bio-CNG (compressed natural gas) plants and allied infrastructure at a cost of Rs 7,000 crore (US$ 1.10 billion) to promote the use of clean fuel.

Some of the major initiatives taken by the Government of India to promote oil and gas sector are:

• Indian Scheme ‘Kayakave Kailasa’ - enabled SC/ST entrepreneurs in providing bulk LPG transportation.
• Plan to set up around 5,000 compressed biogas (CBG) plants by 2023.
• Plan to double natural gas production to 60 bcm and drill more than 120 exploration wells by 2022.