Rosneft Planning to Drill Three Exploration Wells in Sakhalin-3 Project in 2008

YUZHNO-SAKHALINSK. Feb 14 (Interfax) – Russia’s Rosneft (RTS: ROSN) is planning to drill three exploratory wells in 2008 at the Veninsky block of the Sakhalin-3 project in the Sea of Okhotsk, Alexei Romanov, deputy general director of project management at CJSC Sakhalin Projects, told Interfax.

One well will be drilled at the Veninsky block at the North Veninsky structure and two wells will be drilled at the West Kamchatka shelf at the West Sukhanovksy and North Krutogorovsky structures, he said. Each well will have a depth of more than 3 kilometers.

“We are planning to drill all three wells and test the wells in the framework of each project. As is usually the case, this is a very difficult task for the shelf of the Okhotsk Sea because of the small window the weather provides. The weather will give us three to four months from June to early October to drill and test the wells,” he said.

“The sea depth at the Veninsky block, which is about 30 meters at the drilling point, allows for using self-elevating floating drilling rigs. At the West Kamchatka shelf, where the sea depth reaches 300 plus meters, drilling is only possible with the mobile floating drilling rig,” he said.

Romanov noted that no environmentally or industrially unsafe incidents occurred during drilling on the shelf of the Okhotsk Sea in 2004-2007 in projects where Rosneft was the majority shareholder.

Rosneft has a 74.9% stake in the Sakhalin-3 project at the Veninsky block, while China’s Sinopec has a 25.1% stake. Venineft is the operator of the project and the owner of licenses for the geological exploration of the Veninsky block’s resources. Sinopec will finance 75% of exploration costs at the block. Rosneft will finance 25% of the costs out of its own resources. Investment in the project reached $69.8 million by January 1, 2007.

The resources of the Veninsky block are estimated at 169.4 million of oil and 258.1 billion tonnes of gas. The Veninsky license district covers some 5,300 square kilometers of the shelf of the Sea of Okhotsk at a depth from 25 to 150 meters. Six promising structures were identified at the bloc given the analysis of seismological materials.

Rosneft has a 60% stake in the West Kamchatka project, while South Korea’s KNOC has 40%. The operator of the project and the owner of licenses is Kamchatneftegaz, a wholly owned subsidiary of West Kamchatka Holding BV, in which Rosneft has 60% and K.K. Korea Kamchatka Co. Ltd (KKC) has 40%. Forecast reserves in the 60,000- square kilometer section of the West Kamchatka shelf are preliminarily estimated at 900 million tonnes of oil equivalent in 26 structures. Rosneft officials have said the project is comparable in scale to the Sakhalin-1 and Sakhalin-2 projects.

(c) 2008 Daily News Bulletin; Moscow – English. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights Reserved.