{"id":28432,"date":"2024-12-04T11:42:02","date_gmt":"2024-12-04T06:12:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=28432"},"modified":"2025-04-08T19:15:35","modified_gmt":"2025-04-08T13:45:35","slug":"oilfields-regulation-and-development-amendment-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/oilfields-regulation-and-development-amendment-bill\/","title":{"rendered":"Oilfields (Regulation and Development) Amendment Bill, 2024"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><strong>About Oilfields (Regulation and Development) Amendment Bill, 2024:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>It is a bill to <strong>amend the Oilfields (Regulation and Development) Act, 1948<\/strong>, aiming to boost investment in oil and gas exploration and production.<\/li>\n<li>The bill will <strong>regulate the exploration and extraction of natural gas and petroleum<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>The amended bill <strong>expands the definition of mineral oils to include petroleum and natural gas <\/strong>in it.<\/li>\n<li>The amended bill <strong>includes any naturally occurring hydrocarbon<\/strong>, <strong>coal bed methane<\/strong>, and <strong>shale gas\/oil in the category of mineral oils<\/strong>.\u00a0<\/li>\n<li>However, it clarifies that mineral oils will <strong>not include coal, lignite, or helium.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li>It also <strong>provides for mining leases<\/strong>; this will include various activities such as <strong>exploration, prospecting, production, making merchantable,<\/strong> and <strong>disposal of mineral oils<\/strong>.\n<ul>\n<li>Prospecting is the initial stage in the search for oil and gas fields, involving the assessment of potential petroleum accumulations across large areas.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>The new bill will <strong>replace<\/strong> the <strong>mining lease with a petroleum lease<\/strong> to cover a similar set of activities. However, <strong>existing mining leases<\/strong> granted under the old Act <strong>will continue<\/strong> to be valid.<\/li>\n<li>The new bill will <strong>empower the central government to make rules on several matters,<\/strong> like <strong>regulating the grant of leases<\/strong>, terms and <strong>conditions of leases,<\/strong> including the minimum and the maximum area and the period of the lease, <strong>conservation and development of mineral oils, methods for producing oil<\/strong>, and <strong>manner of collection of royalties, fees,<\/strong> and taxes.<\/li>\n<li>It also <strong>empowers the central government to make rules on the merger <\/strong>and combination of<strong> petroleum leases<\/strong>, <strong>sharing of production and processing facilities<\/strong>, obligations of lessees towards protecting the environment and reducing emissions, and <strong>alternative mechanisms for resolving disputes<\/strong> in relation to the grant of petroleum leases.<\/li>\n<li>It aims to <strong>decriminalize some of the provisions<\/strong> of the original 1948 law <strong>by introducing &#8220;penalties, adjudication <\/strong>by an adjudicating authority, and appeal as against the order of the adjudicating authority&#8221;.\n<ul>\n<li>For cases of violation of rules, the bill provides to hike the punishment and penalty from a current fine of Rs 1000 to Rs 25 lakhs.<\/li>\n<li>In cases of exploring, prospecting, and production without a valid lease, a penalty of Rs 25 lakhs and continued violations will attract a penalty of Rs 10 lakh per day.<\/li>\n<li>For dispute resolution, the <strong>central government will appoint<\/strong> an officer of the <strong>rank of joint Secretary<\/strong> or above <strong>for adjudication of penalties.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Appeals<\/strong> against the decision of the adjudication officer <strong>can be filed at the Appellate tribunal specified in <\/strong>the <strong>Petroleum and Natural Gas Board Regulatory Board Act, 2006.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<h3><strong>Q1<\/strong>: What is hydrocarbon?<\/h3>\n<p>The term hydrocarbon refers to an organic chemical compound that is composed exclusively of hydrogen and carbon atoms. Hydrocarbons are naturally-occurring and form the basis of crude oil, natural gas, coal, and other important energy sources.<\/p>\n<p><strong>News: <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/energy.economictimes.indiatimes.com\/news\/oil-and-gas\/rajya-sabha-passes-oilfields-amendment-bill-to-modernize-energy-laws-attract-investments\/115938120\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Rajya Sabha passes oilfields amendment bill to modernize energy laws, attract investments<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Oilfields (Regulation and Development) Amendment Bill, 2024 is a bill to amend the Oilfields (Regulation and Development) Act, 1948, aiming to boost investment in oil and gas exploration and production.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":28433,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-28432","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-prelims-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=28432"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28432\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=28432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=28432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}