Transneft designates contractors for construction of ESPO-2 linear part
ITAR-TASS, 29.01.2010
MOSCOW, January 29 (Itar-Tass) — Transneft, Russia’s oil transportation company and operator of the East Siberia – Pacific Ocean (ESPO) project, has designated contractors for the construction of the second stage of the oil pipeline, company spokesman Igor Demin told Itar-Tass on Friday.
“Four companies – Stroytransgaz, Stroinovatsia, Mezhregiontruboprovodstroi and Stroigazkonsalting – won the tender of the operator company for the construction of the ESPO-2 linear part,” he said.
A Transneft’s 100-percent subsidiary, Transneftstroi, started construction of the ESPO-2 on January 14, Demin reaffirmed, adding, “Builders have welded the first 180 metres of the 3,806-kilometre pipe of the ESPO-2 near the In station in the Jewish autonomous district.”
The company’s top management is confident that the tender will make it possible to save more than one billion roubles (USD 1 = RUB 30.43), he said.
The implementation of the second stage of the ESPO project envisages construction of a trunk line from Skovorodino (Amur region) to the seaport of Kozmino and the relevant increase of the throughput capacity at the section between Taishet and Skovorodino (ESPO-1) to 50 million tonnes of oil a year, he said.
The ESPO-2 project envisions construction of a linear line from Skovorodino to Kozmino and an increase of the Kozmino’s terminal capacity, Demin said.
Initially, there will be built eight oil-pumping stations with the overall storage capacity of 300,000 cubic metres, upgrading of the Skovorodino terminal with the increase of its storage capacity by 150,000 cubic metres, enlargement of the Kozmino oil power with an increase of its storage capacity by 150,000 cubic meters.
Three days before the New Year holidays, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin visited the Far East to personally attend the commissioning of the ESPO oil pipeline first stage.
The East Siberia – Pacific Ocean pipeline was created to diversify the export of Russia’s crude oil to the Asia-Pacific markets (Japan, China, Korea). Transneft is the major builder and operator of the pipeline network.
Construction of the ESPO oil pipeline network was commissioned on October 4, 2008 in the area of the Talakan deposit (Western Yakutia), wherefrom a 40-kilometre oil pipeline stretch had been laid down.
Initially, crude was pumped through ESPO reverse regime – to Taishet.
In October 2009, the construction works on the linear stretch of the pipeline network from Taishet to Skovorodino were completed. The first batch of crude for loading to tankers was sent from Skovorodino to Kozmino port by railway.
According to the project, an annual transportation of hydrocarbons through the ESPO-1 network will amount to 30 million tonnes. A half of that amount will be transported through the constructed underground stretch to China, and another half will be delivered by the TransSiberia Railway to the Kozmino oil port.
The special oil port Kozmino, which was commissioned on December 28, is the final point of the ESPO project’s first stage.
The first tanker Moskovsky Universitet (Moscow University) of the Novorossiisk ocean company with 100,000 tonnes of crude was dispatched on the eve of the New Year, on December 30. The first batch of Siberia-produced oil was delivered to Hong Kong.
Transneft plans to transfer monthly 1.2 million tonnes of oil through ESPO and Kozmino to foreign countries.
In 2010, fifteen million tonnes of hydrocarbons will be transhipped through the seaport.
On Wednesday, the press service of the Japanese Mitsubishi Corp. said that its Hong Kong-headquartered subsidiary, Petro-Diamond Company, became the first Japanese company to buy Siberia-produced oil.
The Japanese company purchased 100,000 tonnes of oil from Russia’s Gazprom Neft, the press service said, adding that oil would be loaded onto a tanker at Russia’s newest Kozmino seaport located in Nakhodka Harbour in the near future.
The ESPO-1 will operate up to commissioning the second stage of the project.
The second stage of the ESPO pipeline will run through the Amur region, the Jewish Autonomous Region, Khabarovsk and Primorsky territories.
With the commissioning of the second stage of the ESPO the capacity of the system will grow to 80 million tonnes annually.
