India’s LNG imports in June dropped by 6.9 percent in June following a slight increase in May as the country started to loosen coronavirus lockdown restrictions.
India started easing the restrictions, which halted economic activity and pushed down demand, in the second part of May but oil and gas demand is still low and it will take time for recovery to pre-Covid levels.
The country imported 2.67 billion cubic meters of LNG last month or about 1.97 million tonnes, data from the oil ministry’s Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell shows.
Furthermore, the value of June LNG imports eased to $0.6 billion compared to $0.9 billion in the same month last year.
Looking at India’s domestic natural gas production, it dropped 12 percent last month to 2.32 bcm.
To remind, India’s LNG imports during the fiscal year ending March 2020 rose 17.2 percent year-on-year to 33.7 bcm or about 25 million tonnes.
In the April-June period, the country imported slightly more than 7 bcm or about 5.18 million tonnes.
This represents a decline of 12.5 percent compared to the same period last year.
India currently imports chilled fuel via six LNG import terminals with a combined capacity of 42.5 million tonnes.
According to PPAC, utilzation of these facilities started gradually to pick after it nosedived in April due to corona restrictions.
Petronet LNG’s 17.5 mtpa Dahej terminal operated at 71 percent capacity while Shell’s 5 mtpa Hazira terminal operated at 78.5 percent capacity in April-May, the data shows.