Are Indian oil majors branching into renewable energy to reduce carbon footprint?

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The Oil and Natural Gas Corporation Ltd (ONGC) has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Solar Energy Corporation of India (SECI) to develop renewable energy projects including solar, wind, solar parks, EV value chain, green hydrogen and storage.</p>
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The move could signal India's oil majors into renewable energy in view of the Climate Change debate. </p>
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<img height="1" src="file:///C:/Users/media/AppData/Local/Temp/msohtmlclip1/01/clip_image001.gif" width="1" />Speaking at the signing ceremony, ONGC CMD, Subhash Kumar said: "While we appreciate the magnitude and urgency of the climate change challenge, we also understand our commitment towards energy security of the country and are committed to carrying out our business in a sustainable manner. ONGC has a multipronged strategy to make its green energy portfolio richer and has plans to progressively move towards carbon neutrality by effective carbon management and adding renewable energy capacity".<br />
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SECI MD Suman Sharma said: "SECI is happy to associate with ONGC in this path-breaking initiative that will open new avenues of sustainable development and promises to take India to new frontiers of technology and scale. We are dedicated towards fulfilling India’s climate commitments and look forward to a continuing partnership".<br />
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ONGC, which is the first non-American company to be a part of Global Methane Initiative (GMI), has been working on renewable energy sources as part of its green energy initiatives. It has set a target of producing a minimum of 10GW renewable power by 2040.<br />
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It is also partnering with IOC for setting up a Carbon Capture, Utilisation and Storage (CCUS) project for enhanced oil recovery from depleted oil fields. The project will utilize CO2 captured from IOC’s Koyali refinery for injecting in the depleted reservoirs of Gandhar oil field in Gujarat. </p>
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ONGC is also conducting a feasibility study with NTPC for India’s first 200-300 MW wind offshore power project.</p>