Dharmendra Pradhan, the Union minister of state for Petroleum & Natural Gas, yesterday launched the #Gas4India campaign, aimed at promoting the use of gas in the country. Public and private sector companies working in the sector have joined hands to promote the natural gas sector. 

"Gas4India is a unified cross-country, multimedia, multi-event campaign to communicate the national, social, economic and ecological benefits of using natural gas as the fuel of choice to every citizen who uses, or will use in the near future, gas in any way – travel, cook, light their homes, and power their business," the ministry's official statement said.

The campaign includes social engagement via Twitter, Facebook, Youtube, LinkedIn, and its official blogsite, as well as hyper local, offline events to directly connect with consumers through discussions, workshops and cultural events.

Making a keynote address, Pradhan said that the country is moving towards the gas-based economy, and it is working to increase the share of gas in the country’s energy basket from the present 6.5%. Complimenting the efforts of all the stakeholders in joining hands for promoting the use of natural gas, he said the government has taken initiatives and policy reforms throughout the gas chain.

The minister said that besides the move to enhance gas production, the government is promoting nationwide gas grid and setting up gas infrastructure. He added that GAIL has already finished the tendering process for gas grid and actual process of laying pipelines will begin soon. Meanwhile, the government is going to take steps to harness synthetic gas from Coal Bed Methane, and also promoting bio-CNG and bio-PNG, with three new LNG terminals also coming up.

The minister further stated the government’s highest priority is PNG. In this regard, he also held meeting with senior officers and representatives from 20 cities in New Delhi. As per the minister, the government is open to suggestions in this regard and will adopt good new business models. In the meeting he emphasised that PNG should be taken in mission mode so that environment-friendly fuel is available to people at the earliest. The issues of road cutting fee, uniform tax for PNG, provisioning of PNG infrastructure for upcoming smart cities were also discussed.

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