The Indian gas transmission company GAIL has secured a regulatory approval from the Indian Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board (PNGRB) to extend the RUP129.4bn (US$2.03bn) Urja Ganga gas pipeline project by another 750 km to Guwahati in the north eastern Indian state of Assam. The pipeline extension aims to enable a better use of the Manilpur, Arunachal Pradesh and Silchar Valley gas deposits and will improve gas supply in north-eastern Indian states.
The Urja Ganga pipeline is also known as the Jagdishpur-Haldia & Bokaro-Dhamra Natural Gas Pipeline (JHBDPL). The project was launched in October 2016 and will span across 2,655 km through the states of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal and Odisha. The gas pipeline will deliver 7.4 mcm/d (2.7 bcm/year) in a first phase and will be later raised to 16 mcm/d (5.8 bcm/year). So far, over Rs 5,176 crore (US$814m) have been awarded to cover the phases I and II of the INR 12,940 crore (US$2bn) project. The project is expected to be completed in December 2022. GAIL started to build the West Bengal segment in February 2018.