Languages

This is where Russia will build its Arctic vessels

The Zvezda yard will be Russia's most modern shipbuilding complex.

Billions are invested in the Zvezda yard outside Vladivostok to make it capable of meeting Russia’s growing demand for ice-protected ships and platforms.

Location

It is the Far East which is the country’s top priority oil and gas region. This is where the quickest growing markeds are and where the raw material prices are the best. New fields, processing plants and pipelines are under planning and both Rosneft and Gazprom have signed major cooperation deals with China and several other Asian powers.

The Zvezda yard will be a centerpiece in Russian industrial developments in the region. Here, few kilometers from the borders to North Korea and China, a key part of Russia’s future oil and gas industry is likely to be shaped.  The new top-modern yard will be able produce the full range of oil and gas-related installations, among them up to 350.000 dwt tankers, LNG carriers, ice-protected ships, drilling rigs and production platforms.

The new construction facilities will be based on the existing, aging yard with the same name located in the Bolshoy Kamen and Pyat Okhotnikov Bays outside Vladivostok. Zvezda was for decades one of Russia’s key sites for construction and repair of nuclear submarines. Now, the sub repairs have all been moved to Sevmash outside Arkhangelsk, while Zvezda is transformed into a non-military yard.  

The total price tag of the Zvezda project is estimated to more than 100 billion roubles (€2,14 billion) and construction works are to be completed in 2018, the company informs

The yard is part of the Far Eastern Shipbuilding and Ship Repair Center (FESRC).

The development of the new Zvezda has not come easy. Originally, it was the state-owned United Shipbuilding Corporation (USC) which was given the responsibility for project development. Then, in 2013, Rosneft President Igor Sechin announced that his company was ready to take over the project in partnership with Gazprombank and the Shipbuilding Corporation. Now, another much wider constellation is moving into the grand yard development. In a state-private partnership, Rosneft in early June this year signed an agreement with Gazprom, Novatek, Sovcomflot, Gazprombank, the United Shipbuilding Corporation and the Ministry of Industry and Trade on Zvezda developments.

Commenting on the deal, Igor Sechin says that the new shipbuilding cluster will become ”Russia’s center of competence building and production capacities needed for the development of offshore fields”, a company press release reads.