Page 12 - FSUOGM Week 01 2023

FSUOGM PROJECTS & COMPANIES FSUOGM

Moscow court clears Shell to sell

stake in Gazprom Neft JV

RUSSIA AN arbitration court in the Moscow region has Russian oil sector. However, Shell has committed
satisfied a claim by a unit of Russia’s Gazprom to leaving Russia in light of Moscow’s invasion
The move should Neft to allow Shell to sell its 50% stake in their of Ukraine.
accelerate a deal by shared joint venture Salym Petroleum, the Prime Shell has said before that it does not want to
Shell to exit the project. news agency reported on December 27. simply walk away from Russia but instead find
The text of the court ruling was not published. buyers for its assets in the country.
But according to Prime, the claimant, GPN-Sa- Gazprom Neft had earlier this year obtained
lym Projects, requested that Shell be allowed to a court order that imposed restrictions on
sell the interest to another unit of Gazprom Neft, Shell’s shareholder rights to sell or other man-
GPN-Middle East Projects. The transfer would age or dispose of its stake in Salym Petroleum,
include Salym Petroleum’s subsoil licences to and the new verdict reverses this decision.
oilfields. GPN-Middle East Projects was incorporated
The court suspended the right of Shell Salym in St Petersburg as a limited liability firm in
Development, the Shell subsidiary that manages 2020 with the purpose of conducting equity
the Anglo-Dutch major’s stake in Salym Petro- investments, according to the company regis-
leum, to continue holding on to the interest and tration data.
to demand its buyout until 2024. Salym Petroleum had relied heavily on Shell’s
Salym Petroleum manages oilfields in the enhanced recovery and reservoir technology to
Western Siberian region, and is one of oldest maintain production rates at three depleting oil-
and most successful foreign partnerships in the fields. ™

Rosneft finds more oil, gas in Yakutia

RUSSIA ROSNEFT has made another oil and gas discov- send oil from its fields in Eastern Siberia to mar-
ery in the Russian Far Eastern region of Yaku- ket, monetising gas reserves is more difficult. The
Rosneft is building up tia, naming it Kubalakhskoye, the company only means of exporting gas from Eastern Sibe-
its gas base in Eastern announced on December 22. ria is the Power of Siberia pipeline that runs to
Siberia. The find comprises 9.5bn cubic metres of nat- China, and Gazprom has exclusive access to this.
ural gas and over 1.5mn tonnes (11mn barrels) Under current Russian law, then, Rosneft’s only
of oil. It was made by Rosneft’s Taas-Yuryakh choice would be first to sell the gas to Gazprom
Neftegazdobycha subsidiary, formerly a joint under a discounted price. It would also have to
venture with BP, which committed to withdraw invest in infrastructure to connect its fields with
from Russia in response to Moscow’s invasion of the Power of Siberia.
Ukraine. There is some speculation in the Russian
Kubalkhskoye is situated next to Sredne- media that the government could scrap Gaz-
botuobinskoye, Taas-Yuryakh’s core field, which prom’s monopoly over gas pipeline exports fol-
flows oil to Asia-Pacific markets via the Eastern lowing the collapse in the energy relationship
Siberia–Pacific Ocean (ESPO) pipeline system. between Russia and Europe. Gazprom’s gas
Rosneft noted that the existing infrastructure at exports to the continent have dropped to an all-
the site would help support the development of time low of less than 2 bcm per month, or 24 bcm
the new field’s reserves. on an annualised basis. In 2021, Gazprom sold
“The results of the IP Kubalakhskaya bore- some 155 bcm of gas to Europe.
hole not only made it possible to explore a new Rosneft found a much larger gas field in
field, but also determined the scope for further Yakutia some 75 bcm in size in January 2021,
exploration work in this area,” Rosneft said. “It naming the field Ivan Kulbertinov. It then
is already planned to drill four more exploration booked a further 40 bcm of reserves in the
wells to study the area.” region in July that year, after discovering the
While ESPO provides a means for Rosneft to Kederginskoye field.™

P12 www. NEWSBASE .com Week 01 04•January 04•2022