One of the world’s largest consumers of oil and coal, India, is investing tens of billions of dollars to build a national gas grid and the necessary import terminals by 2024, in a bid to cut its carbon emissions.

The country has been struggling to boost its use of natural gas (which produces less greenhouse gas emissions than coal or oil) because many industries and towns are not linked to its gas pipeline network.

According to the country’s oil minister Dharmendra Pradhan, companies are investing $60 billion in the network and building new gas import facilities to link all states by mid-2024. “I am not talking about potential investment. This number relates to the projects that are under execution,” said Pradhan.

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India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi had previously set a target to more than double the share of gas in the country’s energy mix to 15 percent by 2030.

The nation’s biggest gas utility, Gail, said it was close to completing the 2,660 km (1,660 miles) Urja Ganga pipeline project, which will connect the eastern states of Bihar, West Bengal, Jharkhand and Odisha. The pipeline will have a capacity for 16 million standard cubic meters per day (mscmd) of gas. India’s overall gas consumption is about 166 mscmd.

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The Urja Ganga project will be ready by the end of next year, according to Pradhan. He said the government had started building the northeast gas grid to connect eight states in northeastern India, a region bordering Bhutan, Myanmar, Bangladesh and China. The grid will be ready by 2023.

The minister added that, before the end of government's current term (mid-2024), “India will be connected by a pipeline ring that will help transport gas from any corner of India to a demand center.”

Most of India's liquefied natural gas (LNG) import terminals are in the west, which makes it difficult for industries in the east and elsewhere to secure regular gas supplies.

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