Urja Ganga Project

Urja Ganga Project

Pradhan Mantri Urja Ganga Gas Pipeline Project or simply known as the Urja Ganga Project is a planned pipeline of 2655 km to be laid from laid from Jagdishpur (eastern Uttar Pradesh) to Haldi (West Bengal) with extension lines to Bokaro (Jharkhand) and Dhamra (Odisha). Henceforth, it is also known as the Jagdishpur-Haldi/Bokaro-Dhamra Pipeline (JHBDP). The project was inaugrated by the Prime Minister Narendra Modi in his constituency Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh on 24 October, 2016, and the estimated cost of the project is Rs. 12940 crore. It will provide Piped Natural Gas (PNG) to households, Compressed Natural Gas (CNG) to vehicles, and Liquified Natural Gas (LNG) to industries.

Key Facts
1. The project is being implemented by the state run natural gas processing and distrubuting company Gail India (earlier known as Gas Authority of India Limited) in three phases. First phases will setup pipelines between Phulpur and Dobhi with spurlines to Varanasi, Gorakhpur, Patna and Barauni. Phase 2 of the project would include the Dobhi-Durgapur and Dhamra-Angul stretches, and phase 3 would include the Bokaro-Angul-Durgapur-Haldia stretch.
2. It is considered as the major step toward the growth and development of the Eastern India. It will benefit seven najor cities of the Eastern India viz Varanasi, Jamshedpur, Patna, Ranchi, Kolkata, Bhubaneswar, and Cuttack, and provide an estimate of 20 lakh gas connection to households.
3. Moreover, 25 industrial clusters in 5 states will be developed using gas from this pipeline. This will benefit more than 40 districts and 2600 villages. Moreover, it will help now dying fertilizer industry of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal.
4. It will extend the 11000 km long existing gas pipeline network of Gail India by 2655 km.
5. The first phase of the project is supposed to be completed by January 2019 and the whole project is supposed to be completed by 2020.

Barauni-Guwahati Gas Pipeline
In November 2018, the Government of India has also annouced an proposed 729 km extention of the gas pipeline to Barauni and Guwahati. The extention line project is known as the Barauni-Gawahati Pipeline Project, and it has increased the the total length of pipelines under Urja Ganga Project to 3376 km, and reach to 70 disticts in 6 states.