Oil Regulator Extends Bidding Date for City Gas Licence

New Delhi: Finding no bidders for one-third of the 14 cities it had bid out for city gas licence, the Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board (PNGRB) has extended by one month the last date for bidding for right to retail CNG and piped cooking gas.

The oil regulator did not receive any bid for Ranga Reddy and Medak district, Nalgonda, Khamman (in Andhra Pradesh), Shahjahanpur in Uttar Pradesh and Guna in Madhya Pradesh on close of extended deadline on August 11.

The regulator said in a notice that it has decided to extend the last date for bidding to September 11.

On August 11, it had received 44 bids mostly for cities like Bengaluru and Pune. Adani Gas-Indian Oil combine bid for six cities while state gas utility GAIL put in bid for five.

Other firms that bid for city gas distribution licences at the close of bidding included Bharat Petroleum Corp Ltd (BPCL), Hindustan Petroleum Corp Ltd (HPCL), Gujarat Gas and GSPC, sources said.

Oil regulator PNGRB had in September last year invited bids for development of CGD networks in Eranakulam in Kerala; Rangareddy/Medak, Nalgonda and Khammam in Andhra Pradesh/Telengana; Bengaluru rural and urban districts in Karnataka; Raigarh, Pune and Thane in Maharashtra; Daman; Dadar & Nagar Haveli; Shahjahanpur in UP; Guna in MP; Panipat in Haryana, and Amritsar in Punjab.

 Adani-IOC combine bid for Eranakulam, Bengaluru, Daman, Dadar and Nagar Haveli, Amritsar and Panipat.

GAIL Gas Ltd, the city gas distribution arm of GAIL, bid for Bengaluru, Amritsar, Panipat, Daman and Dadar and Nagar Haveli.

Bengaluru got eight bids from firms like Adani-IOC, GAIL Gas, GSPC, HPCL and BPCL while Pune got two bids from Mahesh Infra and Maharashtra Natural Gas Ltd, they said.

Bids for the latest round of city gas distribution (CGD) licences were originally due on 11 February, but PNGRB in January extended the deadline to May 12. On April 23, it extended bid deadline to July 10 and last month it further pushed it back to August 11.

Bidders had been asked to quote the tariff they will charge for the pipeline network to be laid in the city and the compression charge for dispensing CNG (compressed natural gas) over the next 25 years.

They have also been asked to quote the inch-kilometre of steel pipelines they will lay during first five years and the number of domestic consumers proposed to be connected by piped natural gas, according to the regulator.