Deora made guest of honour in Qatar
Qatar must be relishing its role as India’s premier supplier of LNG.
How else to explain its decision to invite oil minister Murli Deora to make the keynote speech at the annual 6th Doha Gas Conference this week “Qatar holds this conference every year,â€‌ a participant tells us, “and this year they decided to make the Indian delegation chief guests.â€‌ With good reason! When Qatar completes construction of 14 trains to produce 77m tonnes of LNG, almost 10% (7.5m t/y) is destined for India.
Already RasGas supplies 5m t/y, equivalent to 18m cm/d, or 20% of all the gas consumed in India today. After 2009, when RasGas begins supplying the balance 2.5m t/y, the figure will rise to an impressive 27m cm/d.
“India is one of Qatar’s biggest customers,â€‌ we hear. But will Qatar sell more to India, as Deora no doubt requested during his three-day stay “The Qataris never commit anything,â€‌ we hear.
“All they do is â€کnod’ and in India this gets mistaken as a positive signal.â€‌