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Reliance Industries (RIL) has announced commercial production of oil from its D-6 block in the Krishna-Godavari oil and gas fields. The company has also announced likely commencement of commercial production of gas from Jan-March 2009 quarter, as against an earlier announced timeline of October 2008. This is having a negative impact on the entire Power, Fertiliser and Transport sectors which have been awaiting Natural Gas Supplies from Reliance to flow in.
For instance, Power plants of GVK Power and Infrastructure Ltd. (GVK) and GMR Infrastructure Ltd. (GMR), have been lying idle for want of gas and both the entities were expected to commence power generation from October 2008, using gas supplies from RIL's D-6 block. The delay in gas production and supply is expected to hit earnings and revenues of GMR's and GVK's gas-based power plants and hence their consolidated earnings. To factor in the delay in commencement of natural gas and power generation, RILs, GMRs and GVK Power's consolidated earnings are likely to decline from 9 to 13 per cent.
RILs KG fields to commence gas production from Jan-Mar 2009
While Reliance Industries (RIL) has from September 17 2008 commenced production of oil from the D-6 block in its Krishna-Godavari (KG) basin oilfields. The commercial production of gas however, is expected to commence only from the period January-March 2009. Consequently, RIL is expected to start selling gas to various users, including gas-based power plants, from Q4FY09 as against earlier estimates of October 2008.
Thus RIL will lose Gas Revenues for an additional quarter, moreover build-up in Gas capacities may further delay potential well into FY10, thus resulting in a setback for the earlier forecast FY09 numbers which had assumed a small gas production for atleast 6 months.
Meanwhile GMR and GVK await gas supplies for their power plants
GMR and GVK currently have gas-based power plants of capacities of 389MW and 684MW respectively, which are lying idle for want of gas. While GMR's Vemagiri plant (389MW) was operational for part of the current year (FY09), using gas diverted from other sources by the Andhra Pradesh government, GVK's Jegurupadu-II (220MW) and Gautami (464MW) power plants have remained non-operational throughout the year.
Moreover, GVK's Jegurupadu-I power plant, is currently operating at low PLFs (65-70%) due to limited gas supplies. Based on earlier announcements by RIL and GMR/GVK, both these concerns had factored in commencement of gas supplies from October 2008 and consequently, commencement of commercial operations at these power plants. Based on the revised timeline of gas supplies announced by RIL, the commercial operations at power plants of GMR and GVK will now result in Q4FY09.
While RILs earnings can substantially differ if the pricing for Gas supplies to NTPC is decided on an adhoc basis by the GOI, the consolidated earnings for GMR and GVK will fall atleast 9% to 13% only due to the delay. However, if gas is priced at current market rates which Investors in KG fields and the RIL management wants the dedicated power projects of NTPC, GMR and GVK will become unviable making their PPAs signed with Central or State Power Buyers redundant totally.
In any case it is now a done deal that considering the 3-4 month delay in CoD, GMR's Vemagiri power plant GVK's Jegurupadu-II and Gautami power plants, will continue to operate at lower PLFs for another 3-4 months.