Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) and London-headquartered BP Plc on Friday announced the start of production from the R-Cluster, an ultra-deep-water gas field in block KG D6 off the east coast of India. Production from the R-Series field was expected to start in June but was delayed because of the pandemic-led disruptions. Reliance and its partner BP had in June 2017 announced an investment of  Rs 40,000 crore in the three sets of discoveries to reverse the flagging production in the KG-D6 block. These include– R-Cluster, Satellite Cluster, and MJ field. R-Cluster is the first to come on stream. The company said these clusters together are expected to meet 15 per cent of India’s gas demand by 2023.

Mukesh Ambani, chairman, and managing director, RIL said, “This is a significant milestone in India’s energy landscape, for a cleaner and greener gas-based economy. Through our deep-water infrastructure in the Krishna Godavari basin, we expect to produce gas and meet the growing clean energy requirements of the nation.”

These projects will utilize the existing hub infrastructure in KG D6 block of which RIL is the operator with a 66.67% participating interest. BP holds the rest.

R-Cluster has located about 60 km from the existing KG D6 Control and Riser Platform (CRP) off the Kakinada coast and comprises a sub-sea production system tied back to CRP via a sub-sea pipeline. Located at a water depth of greater than 2000 meters, it is the deepest offshore gas field in Asia.