Rosneft Strikes Oil At New Field In Siberia

Rosneft has discovered oil in a new field in Western Siberia, with reserves estimated at 20 million tons of crude oil (146.6 million barrels) and some 1 billion cubic meters of natural gas, the company said.

The discovery will help Rosneft fulfill its reserve replacement program, which aims at a replacement rate of 100 percent.

The Novoognennoye field is the fourth new oil field discovered as part of the Vankor project, which is exploring for oil and gas in the northern part of the Krasnoyarsk territory and the Yamal-Nenets autonomous district.

Since the launch of the project in 2009, its resource potential has doubled, with crude oil reserves increasing by 20 percent and natural gas reserves rising by 54 percent, Rosneft also said.

The state-owned energy giant is the largest oil producer in Russia, accounting for as much as 40 percent of the country’s total oil production and 5 percent of global oil production. The head of the company, Igor Sechin, has been a vocal opponent to the production cuts agreed by Russia with OPEC and several non-member producers.

Because of the cuts, the company has found it difficult to fulfill its contractual obligations, Reuters reported in May—when the cuts began—citing sources familiar with the matter. According to them, Rosneft did not have enough oil in storage to ship to clients with whom it had long-term supply contracts. This made it challenging for Rosneft to stick to the deepest cuts agreed by OPEC+ after they were supposed to expire in June.

OPEC+ agreed in June to extend the deep cuts until the end of July, interfering with Rosneft’s supply deals with traders such as Trafigura and Glencore.

“There is no doubt Rosneft will strictly fulfil all obligations under supply contracts with its foreign and Russian counterparties despite output cuts made by the company as a part of OPEC+ deal,” Sechin said in late May despite the difficulties.

Source: Oilprice.com

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