India’s LNG imports continued to rise for the second straight month in August following declines in April-June due to Covid-19 coronavirus restrictions.
The country imported 2.97 billion cubic meters or about 2.2 million tonnes of LNG in August, a rise of 5.4% year-on-year, data from the oil ministry’s Petroleum Planning and Analysis Cell shows.
Furthermore, the value of August LNG imports eased to $0.6 billion compared to $0.8 billion in the same month last year.
As per India’s domestic natural gas production, it dropped 9.5 percent during August to 2.43 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-August period, the country imported 12.87 bcm or about 9.46 million tonnes.
This represents a decline of 5.5 percent compared to the same period last year.
India currently imports LNG via six terminals with a combined capacity of 42.5 million tonnes.
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 80.7 percent capacity while Shell’s 5 mtpa Hazira terminal operated at 93.3 percent capacity in April-July, the PPAC data shows.