India’s Oil & Natural Gas Corporation moves towards ammonia production

By Julian Atchison on June 13, 2023

ONGC’s energy transition goals (including ammonia production) were presented at an annual financial results event in Mumbai this May. Source: Oil & Natural Gas Corporation of India.
Click to learn more. ONGC’s energy transition goals (including ammonia production) were presented at an annual financial results event in Mumbai this May. Source: Oil & Natural Gas Corporation of India.

India’s state-owned oil and gas company ONGC will invest $13 billion on energy transition projects by 2030, including ammonia production. During the announcement of ONGC’s financial results at an event in Mumbai last month, Chairman & CEO Arun Kumar Singh revealed ONGC has a renewable energy deployment goal of 10 GW installed by 2030, up from just 189 MW today. ONGC is also working to ensure the renewable energy generation can be integrated into the “round-the-clock” concept being developed across India, where grid-connected renewables are backed up with storage buffers and peaker plants.

At least 5 GW of that deployment will be in Rajasthan, where ONGC and Greenko have an agreement to develop a million-tonne-per-year ammonia production & storage facility, targeting international export markets. Signed in July 2022, the agreement sets out that a 1.3 GW plant will be developed, using John Cockerill’s alkaline electrolyser units. Greenko is seeking to match around 6 GW of solar and onshore wind power with pumped hydro storage, providing a generating platform that guarantees 1.4 GW of continuous electricity generation.

We are excited to be partnering with ONGC, India’s largest Crude Oil & Natural Gas Corporation, in our quest to make India a leader in the global Energy Transition efforts. This pioneering partnership will propel the transformation of India from a carbon-based fossil energy importer to an exporter of Renewable Energy derived products like Green Hydrogen, Green Ammonia and Green Molecules.

Anil Kumar Chalamalasetty, CEO and Managing Director at Greenko in his organisation’s official press release, 26 July 2022

Along with the Greenko agreement, ONGC is seeking a similar amount of capacity to deploy (likely in a single project like Rajasthan), and is evaluating the inclusion of offshore wind. A second million-tonne-per-year ammonia production facility is also being considered in Mangalore, Karnataka, where ACME has announced a similar-sized facility. As ONGC CEO Arun Kumar Singh explained to reporters at the Mumbai event, “everything is on the table”.