BAKU, Azerbaijan, Apr.14
By Nargiz Sadikhova - Trend:
Tengizchevroil (TCO) company which develops Kazakhstan’s Tengiz oil and gas field is temporarily suspending all construction activities, Trend reports with reference to the company.
TCO said that it continues to take actions to prevent the spread of COVID-19 among its workforce in Tengiz. As reported earlier, as part of the response measures, TCO will temporarily reduce the number of non-essential personnel based at the field.
As a result of the confirmed COVID-19 cases among the company’s workforce, TCO will reduce activities and personnel to ensure their safety and to minimize the impact of the pandemic on the operations and construction activities.
“The temporary reduction in activities and personnel in Tengiz will involve both Base Business and Future Growth Project – Wellhead Pressure Management Project (FGP-WPMP). For Base Business, this means all construction activities will temporarily stop. For FGP-WPMP, only certain activities that are on the project’s critical path will continue,” the company said.
TCO notes that these measures have been implemented in order to protect the health and safety of the Tengiz workforce and are not related to current market conditions.
As of today, TCO production operations continue as normal, the company said.
On March 15, 2020, Kazakhstan’s President Kassym Jomart Tokayev signed a decree introducing an emergency state in Kazakhstan due to the coronavirus outbreak, which came in force from 08:00 (GMT +6) on March 16 and will last till 08:00 April 15, 2020.
On Apr. 10, 2020 Tokayev said that the emergency state period in Kazakhstan will be extended till the end of Apr. 2020.
Total number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Kazakhstan has reached 1,091. The first two cases of coronavirus infection were detected in Kazakhstan among those who arrived in Almaty city from Germany on March 13, 2020.
The outbreak of the coronavirus began in the Chinese city of Wuhan (an international transport hub), at a fish market in late December 2019. The number of people killed by the disease has surpassed 119,800. Over 1.9 million people have been confirmed as infected. Meanwhile, over 458,500 people have reportedly recovered.
The World Health Organization (WHO) declared COVID-19 a pandemic on March 11. Some sources claim the coronavirus outbreak started as early as November 2019.
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