1. Vol. VII Issue 5 April - June 2012
Petrotech 2010
Delegates: 3836
Petrotech 2009
Delegates: 3715
Petrotech 2007
Delegates: 4032
Petrotech 2005
Delegates: 3872
Petrotech 2003
Delegates: 3376
Petrotech 2001
Delegates: 2676
Petrotech 1999
Delegates: 1875
Petrotech 1997
Delegates: 1500
Petrotech 1995
Delegates: 1591
10TH INTERNATIONAL OIL & GAS CONFERENCE AND EXHIBITION
Hydrocarbon and Beyond: Changing Landscape
14th -17th October 2012, New Delhi
www.petrotech.in
Panaromic View of HMEL Bhatinda Refinery (Cover Story)

2. Corporate Members CONTENTS
Foreword
Sudhir Vasudeva, Chairman Petrotech, CMD ONGC 3
Messages
Naresh Kumar, President Petrotech & CMD, Deepwater Drilling Industries Ltd. 5
Ashok Anand, Director General Petrotech 6
Editorial
Anand Kumar, Director Petrotech 7
Petrotech welcomes
New Corporate Leaders of Oil and Gas Industry 9
CEOs Speak
R K Singh, Chairman and MD BPCL 12
A K Balyan, CEO & MD Petronet LNG
Cover Story
HPCL-Mittal Energy Limited 15
Drilling Technology - Advances
Laser Drilling Technology – Future of Hydrocarbon Industry 18
Shailendra Dutta
Unearthing the potential of digital oilfield technology 24
Source: From Public Publication of Deloitte
Undrained oil production from a 55 years old field 26
Sasanka Sekhar Deb
Project Management
Chennai- Bangalore Product Pipeline Project: An Engineering Marvel in Project
Implementation 29
U K Dhoot
Sustainability
Carbon & Water Management for Indian Hydrocarbon Industry 34
Rajkumar Ghosh
Alternative Energy
Residential Solar Electricity in Delhi-A Case Study 40
Chudamani Ratnam
Asset Reliability
Ultrasonic Energy Measurement 44
Mike Johnson and John Ward
Editorial Team
20 Minutes with... 48
Karl M Phipps
Ashok Anand
Director General STLE Certification 50
Dr Robert M Gresham
Anand Kumar
Director & Editor
CSR
ONGC- A company that cares 52
G Sarpal CSR - A Lawful conformation today 54
Secretary Dr U D Choubey
Suman Gupta
Back2School
Fundamentals of E&P 57
Manager
Distillation Troubleshooting 60
The views expressed by the authors are their
Special Feature: Women in Business
Women Leaders of Indian Oil Industry 62
own, and do not neccessarily represent that of
Arpana Anand
the Petrotech.
TechScsn 65
Published by
Petrotech at 601-603, Tolstoy House,
Industry Kaleidoscope 69
Tolstoy Marg, Connaught Place, New Delhi - 110 001 Book Scan 71
Petrotech Activities 72

3. Foreword
Dear Colleagues,
Technology is a key enabler;
Technology is a key differentiator;
Technology is a key business driver;
Technology is a key strategic resource;
Technology is also a key cost saver; please allow me to elaborate.
The general belief is that just as all cost indices move up with time, so do our operating costs. In fact
an inter-temporal graphical representation of operating expenditure of most of our companies in the
hydrocarbon space will invariably indicate an acclivity.
I too held firm to this belief until a report of the US Department of Energy of 1999 vintage came to my attention. This report entitled “Environmental
Benefits of Advanced Oil and Gas Exploration and Production Technology” determines that (reproduced from the said report):
• 22,000 fewer wells are needed on an annual basis to develop the same amount of oil and gas reserves as were developed in 1985
• Had technology remained constant since 1985, it would take two wells to produce the same amount of oil and natural gas as one 1985
well. However, advances in technology mean that one well today can produce two times as much as a single 1985 well
• Drilling wastes have decreased by as much as 148 million barrels due to increased well productivity and fewer wells
• The drilling footprint of well pads has decreased by as much as 70 percent due to advanced drilling technology, which is extremely useful
for drilling in sensitive areas
• By using modular drilling rigs and slim-hole drilling, the size and weight of drilling rigs can be reduced by up to 75 percent over traditional
drilling rigs, reducing their surface impact
• Had technology, and thus drilling footprints, remained at 1985 levels, today’s drilling footprints would take up an additional 17,000 acres
of land
The data captures impact of technological benefit to the E & P industry from 1985 to 1999. Surprisingly, no further study appears to have been
commissioned on how technology in our industry has been a cost saver and efficiency multiplier rolled into one.
We could therefore draw the inference that while our ‘opex’ trends invariably head ‘North’, the steepness of this acclivity would have been
much more pronounced, had technological evolution remained a constant.
As we move deeper into brown-field development, ‘reflective seismic technology’ now enables precise location of ‘oil pools’ that were hitherto
‘invisible’ to us, thereby greatly reducing drilling cost as also enabling us to monetise ‘lost’ production; a clear case of efficiency multiplication
in action. In similar vein, ‘through – tube rotary drilling’, ‘slim – hole’ drilling, ‘horizontal production drilling’ facilitated by ‘tight – turn’ drilling
technology, ‘coiled tubing’, ‘measuring while drilling (MWD)’, ‘CO2 – sand fracturing’ are but a few developments that constantly enable us to
enhance production levels as well as to rein – in operating expenditure that would otherwise have increased exponentially.
As in maintenance of existing operations, the challenges of monetising ‘exigent hydrocarbon’, especially deepwater and unconventional resources
are also being addressed by technological evolution. Deep and Ultra – deep operations are as scientifically complex and challenging as space
programmes, perhaps even more so, yet we are there and improving our confidence each day through the inevitable process of iteration in
fine-tuning and customising products. The Shale gas revolution and now Shale oil, emerged from developments in ‘hydro-fracking’ and
now as this technology increasingly draws flack for its adverse environmental footprint, propane – based ‘fracking’ has been developed and
implemented that completely eliminates use of water, a most precious resource.
Disruptive technology is constantly being developed to radically change the way we presently operate; a few examples for your consideration:
• ‘NXT Energy Solutions’ claim to raise the success of first – pass prospecting for trapped hydrocarbon reserves underground by up to 70%
by deploying their unique “Stress Field Detection Surveys’. Pioneering companies such as Ecopetrol and Pacific Rubiales have already
adopted it
• Coal to liquid is passé; coal to chemicals such as ammonia and methanol is the next big thing. While a few plants are in operation in the
JoP, April-June 2012 3

4. United States, it is China that is giving this concept the big push with an investment of nearly US$ 140 Billion over five years into this
technology
• Mantra Ventures, a pioneer in the Carbon Capture and Recycle space (CCR), propose to deploy a process termed ‘Electro-reduction of
Carbon Dioxide (ERC) that combines ‘captured’ carbon dioxide with water to produce high value materials such as formic acid, formate
salts, oxalic acid, and methanol. They too have found support from a $12B market cap company, Lafarge (OTC – LFRGY), the largest build-
ing materials provider in North America and Powertech Labs Inc., a subsidiary of Canadian utility BC Hydro that specializes in the design
and testing of clean energy systems
These are a few examples of tech – savvy pioneers placing huge bets hinged on disruptive technology that have found crucial support from
established industry players. There would surely be many more such examples and it would be most enlightening for our readers if they were
to find space in this journal. I invite you to share your views on these and other related subjects that could be highlighted in the next editions
of this journal.
Meanwhile, Happy Reading !!!
Sudhir Vasudeva
Chairman, Petrotech
CMD ONGC
4 JoP, April-June 2012