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Delayed Arctic breakthrough

Sergey Kostromskoy, captain of the "Prirazlomnaya" platform, has been living major parts of the last two years in the Pechora Sea.

More than two years after schedule, the Prirazlomnaya oil platform has started production in the icy waters of the Pechora Sea. Gazprom is seriously behind schedule also in the several of the neighboring licenses.

Location

After having lain idle in the desolete Pechora Sea since August 2011, the “Prirazlomnaya” platform in late December started pumping oil from Prirazlomnoye, Russia’s first oil producing offshore field in the Arctic. Commenting on production launch, Gazprom CEO Aleksey Miller called the event a historical breakthough in the region. “Let it be no doubt – Gazprom continues the development of the Arctic”, he underlined in a press release.

The “Prirazlomnaya” platform has been under construction for almost a decade. The 505,000 tons stationary installation is placed on the sea bed and can drill, produce and store oil from the field which has estimated reserves of 72 million ton. Production target in 2014 is 300,000 tons while peak annual production of six million tons is due to be reached by 2020, the company informs.

As previously reported, the “Prirazlomnaya” was tugged from the port of Murmansk in August 2011 and has since then been lying idle in the area. 

The “Prirazlomnaya” is not the only Arctic project where Gazprom is seriously delayed. According to company representative Vsevolod Cherepanov, Gazprom has not been able to meet license time conditions in another three Arctic projects, among them the Kruzernshternskoye field in the Kara Sea and the Dolginskoye field in the Pechora Sea. Originally, the company had committed itself to drill seven wells at the former field and one at the latter in 2013. In addition, one well was to be drilled at the far eastern Zapadnoye Kamchatskoye structure, the Agency on Oil and Gas Information reports.

The reason for the delays is reportedly that the company has not been able to get hold of the necessary drilling equipment, including the needed drilling rigs. According to Cherepanov, Gazprom will drill at both the Dolginskoye and Kruzernshternskoye projects in 2014. In the latter project, the company considers to build an artificial island for project development.

In the Dolginskoye project, Gazprom will build two new production platforms, both to be in operation by year 2020.

Gazprom has hired Schlumber as key subcontractor for shelf service operations, while it will use its own capacities for the drilling operations, Angi.ru reports.