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Rosneft starts drilling Russia’s northernmost offshore well

Russian President Vladimir Putin said earlier he believes that Rosneft will follow all the environment protection standards

KHARA-TUMUS PENINSULA, April 3. /TASS/. Oil major Rosneft started drilling Russia’s northernmost offshore Tsentralno Olginskaya-1 well at the Khatanga license area. Russian President Vladimir Putin formally kicked off the start of exploratory drilling during a teleconference with Rosneft CEO Igor Sechin.

"For the first time in history, drilling will be carried out on the Eastern Arctic continental shelf. The resource potential for the Laptev Sea alone, according to experts, reaches 9.5 bln tonnes of oil equivalent. According to the results of seismic operations, Laptev Sea has 4 times more promising structures than have been identified earlier - 114 against 28. We expect that drilling in the Khatanga license area will be at least as successful as in the Kara Sea in 2014," Rosneft CEO said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said earlier he believes that Rosneft will follow all the environment protection standards when drilling in the Khatanga area.

"I know our oil producers at large and Rosneft in particular are always paying particular attention to environmental safety matters. I assume these principles and rules will be adhered to and you will pay the closest attention to that in this case, especially in Arctic conditions, where the ecosystem is very sensitive to any interferences from the outside," Putin said on Monday during the videoconference.

There is "a vast quantity of yet untapped resources" in the Arctic offshore and onshore areas, the Russian President said.

"Assuming the enormous value and criticality of these resources, raw hydrocarbons and other minerals, companies with prevailing government participation are particularly authorized to perform the appropriate work. Licenses are issued to Rosneft and Gazprom only. Rosneft should definitely use these advantages in the best possible way," Putin said.

Drilling in the Arctic region is a complex high-technology operation, the President said. "The so-called "horizontal drilling" is just for the first well. Huge job is to be done in the future; I wish you success and express hope that the whole this undertaking will be successful," he added.

Rosneft started drilling today the northernmost Tsentralno-Olginskaya well on the Khatanga license area in the offshore Arctic region. The design depth of the well to be drilled in the Laptev Sea water area will be 5,000 meters with a further horizontal sidetrack.