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GAIL

Central Public Sector Undertaking

  • 27 min read
  • 6 chapters

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Through Government of India, Natural gas and Wind power

GAIL owns and operates a network of around 13,722 km (8,526 mi) of natural gas pipelines and is building around 6,000 km (3,728 mi) of pipelines of its own and about 2,000 km (1,243 mi) through two joint ventures, as part of the National Gas Grid. The Petroleum and Natural Gas Regulatory Board has authorised GAIL to build the 1,755 km (1,091 mi) long Mumbai-Nagpur-Jharsuguda gas pipeline. In 2023, GAIL completed the world's first ship-to-ship LNG transfer.

History

The Gas Authority of India Ltd. was incorporated in August 1984 as a Public Sector Undertaking (PSU) of the Government of India under the Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas (MoP&NG) to build, operate and maintain HVJ gas pipeline. The 1,750 km (1,087 mi) long pipeline was one of the largest natural gas pipeline projects in the world and was built at a cost of ₹17 billion (US$180 million). Construction began in June 1987 and was energised by July 1989.

In November 1988, GAIL received approval to build a ₹3 billion (US$31 million) LPG extraction plant in Vijaipur with a capacity of 400,000 tpa. Phase I of the plant, with a capacity of 200,000 tpa, was commissioned in 1990-91, eight months ahead of schedule. Phase II was commissioned in February 1992.

GAIL entered into a joint venture agreement with British Gas on 6 December 1994 to create Mahanagar Gas Limited to implement the Bombay City Gas Distribution project. GAIL was awarded Navratna status by the Indian government on 1 January 1997, in acknowledgement of its "excellent track record" and "potential to become a global giant" and providing it with greater autonomy. Later in 1997, GAIL began its city gas distribution pilot project in New Delhi by setting up nine compressed natural gas (CNG) stations. In 1998, GAIL entered into a joint venture with the Bharat Petroleum and the Government of Delhi to create Indraprastha Gas to implement the Delhi gas distribution network.

In March 2000, GAIL commissioned a petrochemical plant with a capacity to process 300,000 tonnes of ethylene to produce 260,000 tonnes of HDPE and LLDPE in Pata, Auraiya district in Uttar Pradesh. The plant, connected to the HVJ pipeline converts natural gas to petrochemicals. In 2016, the plant capacity was doubled to produce 400,000 tons of PE per year. In 2019, In 2018-19, the plant's capacity was doubled to 810,000 tonnes per year. In April 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic in India, lack of market demand caused GAIL to shutdown the plant.

GAIL commissioned the 1,269 km (789 mi) Jamnagar-Loni LPG pipeline. It was the world's longest LPG pipeline when commissioned and supplied 1.7 million TPA to Northern India.

To secure gas for its mainstream business, the Exploration and Production department was created. Today, GAIL is a partner in the Daewoo-OVL-LED consortium in two offshore blocks in Myanmar. The bulk of its blocks is located in India, in the areas of the Gulf of Khambhat, the Assam-Arakan basin, the Mahanadi River Basin, the K-G (Krishna Godavari) basin, and the Kaveri river basin.

GAIL has diversified into petrochemicals, telecom and liquid hydrocarbons other than gas infrastructure. The company has also extended its presence in power, liquefied natural gas (LNG), regasification, city gas distribution and exploration & production through participation in equity and joint ventures. Following these additional ventures, the Gas Authority of India was renamed GAIL (India) Limited on 22 November 2002.

GAIL (India) Limited has shown organic growth in gas transmission through the years by building a large network of trunk pipelines covering a length of around 10,700 kilometres (6,600 mi). Leveraging this, GAIL played a key role as a gas market developer in India for decades, catering primarily to major industrial sectors like power, fertilizer production and city gas distribution. GAIL transmits more than 160 million cubic metres per of gas per day at standard conditions through its dedicated pipelines and has more than 70% market share in both gas transmission and marketing.

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Source and licence. Adapted from the Wikipedia article “GAIL” (this version, 2026-09-10) by its contributors, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0. Lablypedia has left out its tables, references and most pictures, and linked it to other Lablypedia articles.