Cairn hoping new techniques will help pump up oil volume from Rajasthan

SIR Bill Gammell's Cairn Energy is looking for clearance to use enhanced oil recovery techniques that could allow an extra 300 million oil barrels to be pumped from its Rajasthan oilfields.

The Edinburgh-based company headed by the former Scotland Rugby international has reached a "breakthrough moment," with construction of a 600km, £400 million pipeline to develop the fields.

Some 80 per cent of the contracts to create the pipeline have now been awarded, mostly to local Indian contractors.

And with the price of crude oil rising to record levels, experts are increasingly confident that Cairn will be able to meet its target of producing oil from the fields in the second half of 2009.

Addressing the company's subsidiary Cairn India at its annual general meeting, Mr Gammell said that based on a price of $100 a barrel, the organisation would have an operational cash flow of $3 billion a year.

He said: "Supply is getting very tight and demand in Asia is growing."