Mumbai: Mahanagar Gas would invest Rs1,200 crore in the next five years to expand gas distribution infrastructure and its customer base and would fund the expansion through internal accruals. The gas utility has started supplying PNG and CNG to the Mumbai metropolitan area. From the current customer base of 2.9 lakh, Mahanagar Gas plans to double it to six lakhin three years.

The company also plans to sell PNG to small industrial consumers in the State. For supplying gas, the company is also open to a joint venture with the Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation.

Mahanagar Gas provides PNG to over 2.9 lakh homes and 850 small commercial and industrial consumers in the Mumbai metropolitan area. It also supplies CNG to vehicles through 126 CNG stations. Almost 52,000 taxies and cars and 1.24 lakh auto rickshaws in the region have converted to CNG.

ONGC currently supplies gas to Mahanagar Gas under the administrative price mechanism. But in view of the growing demand, Mahanagar Gas is exploring possibilities of procuring gas from other players in the market. The projected demand in five years is 4.5 MMSCMD (million metric standard cubic metres per day) from the current 1.4 MMSCMD of gas.