State-owned GAIl's prestigious 1,000 kilometres long Dabhol-Bangalore natural gas pipeline was officially dedicated to the nation by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Tuesday, who also praised the Maharatna company for achieving diversification in various fields. He at the same time said that India needs to increase its energy supply by three to four times within the next two decades.
The pipeline connects South India to the national gas grid for the first time and has been constructed with an investment of Rs 4,500 crore. It can carry 16 million standard cubic meters per day (mmscmd) of natural gas, which can be used to produce 3,000 MW of clean energy. The pipeline starts at Dabhol in Maharashtra and passes through Belgaum, Dharwad, Gadag, Bellary, Devanagere, Chitradurga, Tumkur, Ramanagaram, Bangalore Rural and Bangalore Urban districts.
It traverses 18 National Highways, 382 roads, 20 railway tracks, 11 major rivers and 276 water bodies, including Asia's largest river crossing in the rocky terrain at Ghatprabha. Construction operations, which continued round-the-clock for 19 months, involved pipeline laying in some of the world's steepest slopes of 60 to 70 degrees and sharp elevations of up to 700 metres in a 3.5 km stretch.
The Prime Minister, while speaking to industry leaders after formally opening the pipeline for operations and inaugurating the 8th Asia Gas Partnership Summit, said that in the changing energy scenario in the world, shale gas had brought about a "sea change" and India was hopeful of discovering shale gas reserves. At the same time he added that India needs to increase its energy supply by three to four times within the next two decades.