VLADIVOSTOK, September 3. /TASS/. A logistics center to handle helium containers near the Russian Far Eastern city of Vladivostok has been launched by President Vladimir Putin via video link.

According to earlier reports, investment in the helium hub established in the Nadezhdinskaya Advanced Special Economic Zone in the Primorsky region exceeds six bln rubles ($82.3 mln). The hub will help transport helium from the Amur gas processing plant, one of Gazprom’s infrastructure projects in Russia’s Far East, which is expected to become part of a regional advanced gas processing center. The plant will process multicomponent natural gas from the Yakutia and Irkutsk gas production centers, delivered by the Power of Siberia gas pipeline. The plant is planned to process 42 bln cubic meters of gas and produce up to 60 mln cubic meters of helium per year.

Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said earlier that Putin "has several times visited the Amur gas processing plant," where a second helium production line was launched a while ago.