Oil India Ropes In France's TotalEnergies For Deepsea Oil, Gas Hunt

Oil India Ltd, the nation's second biggest state-owned explorer, has roped in French energy giant TotalEnergies to provide technical assistance in finding oil and natural gas reserves in deep and ultra-deepwater areas.

"OIL and TotalEnergies inked a technology service agreement on November 19, 2025 in New Delhi to strengthen strategic collaboration for exploration activities in deep and ultra-deepwater offshore frontiers of Indian sedimentary Basins, including the stratigraphic wells as mandated by the government of India," OIL said in a statement on Wednesday.

The agreement puts in place a framework to leverage TotalEnergies' expertise in deep and ultra-deepwater exploration value chain across OIL's current and future offshore portfolio.

It includes the ongoing appraisal programme of gas find in the shallow offshore blocks in Andaman basin as well as exploration in OIL's ultradeep water blocks in Mahanadi and Krishna Godavari Basins. It also covers evaluation of opportunities under current and future bid rounds and providing support during stratigraphic well drilling initiative in offshore Category-II & III Basins, the firm said.

In September, OIL had notified presence of natural gas reserves in a block off the Andaman Islands.

'Occurrence of natural gas' was reported in the second exploratory well Vijayapuram-2 drilled in the Offshore Andaman Block AN-OSHP-2018/1, OIL had said, adding it needed to do tests to confirm the potential of the reserves.

TotalEnergies will now assist the firm in evaluating the potential of the discovery including asserting if it is commercially viable to produce.

Oil India Ltd (OIL) and Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) have been probing for hydrocarbon reserves in the Andaman Sea in the hope of finding a discovery that could help cut India's 88% dependence on imports for its oil needs and 50% reliance on overseas for gas requirements.

'The strategic collaboration marks a significant milestone in OIL's commitment to pursue exploration in offshore frontiers towards possible hydrocarbon discovery and secure sustainable energy future for India,' the company said in the statement Wednesday.