India will contribute to 25% of global energy demand by 2040: Hardeep Singh Puri

India will contribute to 25 percent of the global demand for energy by 2040, Union Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas Hardeep Singh Puri said on January 10.

India was able to navigate the “most formidable energy crisis” on account of its four-pronged energy security strategy, including diversification of energy supplies, increasing India's exploration & production footprint, meeting energy transition through gas-based economy and green hydrogen and electric vehicles, the minister said.

“The government of India intends to increase India's exploration acreage to 0.5 million sq km by 2025 and 1 million sq. km. by 2030,” the minister said. The government successfully reduced the 'No Go' area by 99 percent, opening .91 million sq km of acreage.

“…we have also established the National Data Repository (NDR) and plans are afoot for a cloud-based and AI/ML-powered National Data NDR 2.0,” the minister added. He was referring to an exploration and production data bank for the preservation, upkeep and dissemination of information for the country’s sedimentary basins.