India has been prominently consuming energy from coal,
hydro, nuclear and from past few years by natural gas. India is the fourth
largest energy consumer throughout the world though there is a critical
shortage of electricity generation capacity. Now can this shale gas alter the fortune
of India?
Past half a decade, analysts were
foretelling that the US will be importing natural gas at an increasing rate as
they will be drying out their own resources. The crackling accomplishment of
the oil companies in the US in producing the shale gas resources at large
extent has changed the doom of energy deficit country to a surplus one. Can
this shale gas prove as a silver bullet to India as that in US? A small insight about the shale gas would lead
to the opinions.
Shale gas is unconventional source
of natural gas found in shale formations. It is present in the form of bubbles
in the impermeable shale rock. They are rich in organic matter and chemically it
consists of methane. Shale gas has come into limelight due to technological
advances in horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing.
The way to extract the shale gas is to
vertically drill till it penetrates the shale rock and then make a channel in
the shale formations parallel to the ground known as horizontal drilling. Water
is mixed with sand and chemicals (Hydrochloric acid and carcinogens) and the
mixture is injected at high pressure into these channels to create fractures
which release shale gas. This is known as hydraulic fracturing or otherwise
known as fracking. The efficiency of these works will mainly define the rate of
production of shale gas.
In India the potential of
extraction of shale gas is high. India being one of the largest consumers of
oil and petroleum products imports more than half of oil and gas requirements. Shale
gas production in India itself will truncate the increasing trade imports. This
will lead India to substantially decrease its dependency on Middle East countries.
The recent hikes in electricity price in India are affecting the public and the
manufacturing companies. As the US have cutoff their electricity prices by
shale gas production, India could be expecting the same in the coming years. The
shale gas production can be effective in reducing the greenhouse gas emissions
when compared to coal production though it refers to produce more than the
conventional gas.
Positive side of this technology
has had a great impact on India as an energy deficit country and is alluring towards
investments in this sector. Every technology has its good and bad faces, so
this technology too has its challenging issues which have to be improved to get
the environmental nod. A large amount of water is required to be pumped into this
borehole for fracking. India’s water scarcity condition can’t afford large
amounts of water as one seventh of the world’s population is dependent on the 4%
of the world’s water resources. For this, Indian authority has found a remedy
and has assured of starting these projects in coastal areas and areas with high
rainfall and water logging. With large of water comes large amounts of
chemicals i.e. the deadly hydrochloric acid and carcinogens that would remain in
borehole and can contaminate the ground water. An alternative way of fracking
has been found by GasFrac of Alberta, Canada by using liquefied propane instead
of mixture of water and chemicals.
The increasing no. of earthquakes has
been eminent in the US after the shale gas production started. One of the
theories suggests that it is due to water pushed back into the fault that tends
to cause earthquake by slippage of fault. This is the area this technology has
to be improvised further.
India has a long way to go before
it can successfully extract shale gas. In India, shale gas will be targeted at
Cambay basin, Assam Arakan basin, Damodar Valley, KG Basin and Cauvery basin. The
estimates of shale gas reserves are estimated to be around 60 trillion cubic
feet (TCF). Indian Oil Corporation, OIL, GAIL and RIL have started to invest in
this sector in USA. Realizing the huge potential of shale gas reserves in
India, Government of India is geared up to attract best companies for
its
exploration purposes. It would entirely depend on the policy regulations made
by the government realizing the issues of water, land etc for sustainable development.
No comments:
Post a Comment