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President Nursultan Nazarbayev believes Kazakhstan has enough oil even without Kashagan, Tengrinews reports.
President Nursultan Nazarbayev believes Kazakhstan has enough oil even without Kashagan, Tengrinews reports.
Recognizing the complexity of the Kashagan oil field, Nazarbayev expressed hope that production of oil at Kashagan would be resumed in the end of 2015.
“This is our pain. It is the largest discovery in the world after the Alaska oilfield. The reserves are immense. But the oilfield is very complex. As oilmen put it, Kashagan is very viscous, sulphurous and heavily overpressurized. The pressure in the reservoir reaches 600-700 and even 1000 atmospheres in places. Imagine the kind of equipment required to work it. That is why it is so hard to develop this oilfield,” Nazarbayev said.
Oil production at Kazakhstan’s largest oil field Kashagan was supposed to start last year, but a force-majour happened, Nazarbayev said.
"All the pipes were in place, the refinery for sulfur and gas liberation was about to start working when cracks were discovered in pipes, those submerged in the water and place above the water. Had the field continued producing there could have been a large accident. So the production had to be suspended to replace the high pressure pipes. The failure was especially surprising because those pipes were produced in Japan. Now the company is working on it together with KazMunaiGas. The schedule has been made, the restoration costs are over two billion dollars. In the end of this year or in 2016 we hope to get some oil from the field. This will be a very timely addition for implementation of all the programs we have planned for the future," the president said.
"A lot of oil, a lot of gas, plus construction of new refineries and gas treating plants - all these will be working for the good of our future. We need to wait," Nazarbayev said.
He added, however, that even the existing amounts of oil production were enough for Kazakhstan to keep going. "The current oil production is enough. When delays like this happen I always say that more will remain for our future generations. What we have should suffice for us", he siad.
Reporting by Assemgul Khassenova, writing by Gyuzel Kamalova, editing by Tatyana Kuzmina
