Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Industries Ltd has announced a new gas discovery in the Mahanadi basin, making it in the 8th in NEC-Mahanadi block NEC-OSN-97/2 offshore Orissa in the Bay of Bengal.
The development plan of the discovery, "Dhirubhai 40", has been intimated to the Directorate General of Hydrocarbons. The block covers an area of 10,755 sq. km with water depths ranging from 20m to 600m. The discovery, whose commercial potential is being established, comes at a time when RIL is racing to bring to production its D-6 block in the Krishna-Godavari basin. The company plans to invest $3 b in NEC-Mahanadi basin.