Eric Watkins
Senior Correspondent
LOS ANGELES, Sept. 26 -- India's ONGC Videsh Ltd. (OVL) plans to ship 700,000 bbl of crude oil from the Sakhalin-I project off Russia to India every 70 days beginning in April 2006.
The Sakhalin-I consortium partners are reported to have hired five ice class tankers on long-term charter under the crude offtake agreement. The tankers will be ready for delivery by January 2006, and OVL will hire one tanker to transport its output of around 50,000 b/d to India.
Oil from the project's offshore fields will be piped 226 km across Sakhalin Island and the Tatar Strait to De-Kastri port on the Russian mainland, where an export terminal is under construction.
The field has reserves estimated at more than 2.3 billion bbl of crude oil and 485 billion cu m of natural gas.
The Sakhalin-I partners are Exxon Neftegas Ltd., operator, 30%; Japan's Sodeco, 30%; Russia's RN-Astra LLC, 8.5%; Russia's Sakhalinmorneftegaz-Shelf, 11.5%; and OVL, 20%.
Contact Eric Watkins at [email protected].