Astana, Kazakhstan, Nov.19
By Daniyar Mukhtarov - Trend:
Russia is interested in expansion of oil supplies from Kashagan via the Atyrau-Samara pipeline, the Oil and Gas Minister of Kazakhstan Uzakbai Karabalin told Trend.
"Russia is interested in expansion of oil supplies from Kazakhstan's Kashagan field via the Atyrau-Samara pipeline as well," he said.
The owner of the pipeline section running up to the Russian border is the Kazakh transport company KazTransOil and the owner of the pipeline section in the Russian territory is Transneft.
Production at Kashagan - one of the largest fields in the world - was suspended in September due to a gas leak.
Almost immediately after the suspension of production in October, another gas leak was detected. Initially it was assumed that the production at Kashagan will amount to eight million tons next year and will increase to 12 million tons in 2015.
Earlier, Karabalin said after the plenary session of the Majilis (lower house) of Kazakhstan's Parliament that oil production at Kashagan field can be resumed from the second half of December 2013.
According to Kazakhstan's Oil and Gas Ministry, Kashagan produced over 50,000 barrels of oil per day before the detection of the gas leak. In November the commercial production was to be some 75,000 barrels per day.
Initially, it was planned to start the production at Kashagan field in 2005, but the time of commissioning was put off and the participants of the project explained this with the difficulty of development of the offshore field.
The Uzen-Atyrau-Samara oil pipeline is the heated main oil pipeline. It was constructed from Uzen field to Atyrau refinery and further is linked to Transneft oil pipelines' system in the direction of Samara.
The length of the Uzen-Atyrau-Samara oil pipeline is over 1,380 kilometers, while 1,232 kilometers run through Kazakhstan. The volume of pumped oil is 15.75 million tons. The pipeline passes through Mangistau, Atyrau and West Kazakhstan provinces and the Samara province of Russia.
The volume of pumped oil is 15.75 million tons. The maximum capacity of the pipeline is 30 million tons of oil per year.