Page 16 - FSUOGM Week 27 2019
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FSUOGM PROJECTS & COMPANIES FSUOGM
Rosneft breaks ground at Eastern Siberian field
RUSSIA
The eld is near Rosneft’s agship Verkhnechonskoye project.
RUSSIA’S Rosneft has announced the start of commercial development of the North- Danilovskoye oil eld in Eastern Siberia, follow- ing four years of trial operations.
North-Danilovskoye is the rst of four elds that Rosneft plans to develop in the Katanga district of the Irkutsk region. e deposits are situated near to Eastern Siberia’s largest oil eld, Verkhnechonskoye, which Rosne brought on stream in 2008.
According to the company, the North- Danilovskoye project will involve the drilling of 95 production wells at 10 cluster sites, as well as the construction of 31 MW of gas- red power generation, in- eld pipelines, roads, reservoir pressure management units and other support infrastructure. Tender records show that Rosne has been selecting contractors for drilling and construction services at the site since Septem- ber last year. It opened its latest tender on July 3, o ering up to RUB182mn ($2.9mn) for well development.
Rosne operates North-Danilovskoye and the other three elds it has slated for develop- ment – South-Danilovskoye, Verkhneicherskoye and Lisovskogo – through its Verkhnechonsk- ne egaz (VCNG) subsidiary. All four will be
connected via pipeline with Verkhnechonskoye, also managed by VCNG, where their oil will be separated from gas and water and processed. Construction of the link is expected to start this year, according to Rosne .
Following its discovery in 2011, Rosneft estimated North-Danilovskoye’s recoverable resources at 550mn barrels of oil and 35bn cubic metres of gas. e company now assesses total reserves of the four new elds at 2.3bn barrels of oil. It intends to continue exploratory drilling in the area.
Verkhnechonskoye was among the rst oil- fields to enter production in Eastern Siberia, with full-scale development made possible by the completion of the Eastern Siberia - Paci c Ocean (ESPO) oil pipeline in 2009. Verkhne- chonskoye is linked via an 83-km pipeline to ESPO, which is used by Rosne and other Rus- sian producers to deliver oil to China and other Asia Paci c markets.
Initially a minority partner, Rosne gained full control of Verkhnechonskoye and VCNG’s other assets through its 2013 takeover of UK-Russian joint venture TNK-BP. It went on to sell a 20% stake of VCNG in 2017 to China’s Beijing Gas Group (BGG).
Novatek lined up for Gydan score
RUSSIA
The government has supported Novatek’s Arctic expansion.
NOVATEK looks set to receive rights to a Soviet-era gas find on the Gydan Peninsula uncontested.
Under a decree signed by Russian PM Dmi- try Medvedev, Moscow will hold an auction later this year o ering a subsoil licence to the 1985 Soletsko-Khanaveyskoye gas eld. Soviet engineers initially dismissed the deposit as too remote to develop and it was later ringfenced as part of the country’s strategic petroleum reserve. According to Russia’s RBC, which claimed to have seen a copy of the government’s decree, the minimum price for bids in the auction has been xed as 2.4bn rubles ($38mn).
Soletsko-Khanaveyskoye is estimated to contain 154.7bn cubic metres of gas in C1+C2 reserves and as much as 1.8tn cubic metres in total in-place resources. While a field of this size would normally attract erce competition among Russia’s leading oil and gas majors, licence terms state that the eld’s gas can only be used to
produce LNG, by a company with local expertise. is e ectively closes the door on all devel- opers bar Novatek and its subsidiaries. Novatek is the only active LNG producer in the area, although several of its rivals have projects in the pipeline. e company entered the LNG market a er launching its 16.5mn tonne per year Yamal LNG terminal in December 2017. It is planning to establish a second 19.8mn tpy liquefaction plant on Gydan, known as Arctic LNG-2, by
2023.
Novatek aims to ramp up annual LNG pro-
duction of 70mn tonnes by 2030. It is working on blueprints for several more projects beyond Yamal LNG and Arctic LNG-2, but will need more resources to realise these ambitions.
Keen to support Russian LNG expansion, the government has given Novatek generous tax breaks and other regulatory support. It has also seen to it that the company lands rights to many of the Russian Arctic’s largest gas deposits.
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w w w . N E W S B A S E . c o m Week 27 09•July•2019
