Eric Watkins
Senior Correspondent
LOS ANGELES, Jan. 15 -- Russia's state-owned OAO Transneft reported it has constructed about 530 km of the planned 4,188-km East Siberia Pacific Oil Pipeline (ESPO).
Construction on the pipeline, which is intended to serve the Asia-Pacific region, is currently under way between Taishet and Ust-Kut in the Irkutsk region and Tynda and Skovorodino in the Amur region along the Chinese border.
A spokesman for Transneft's project management center said the company also established storage facilities and operation bases during 2006 along the pipeline.
He said the firm is thus positioned to start extending ESPO quickly on the basis of feasibility studies made and approved in 2006. He said Transneft plans to lay about 1,250 km of the pipeline in 2007.
A feasibility study of the first extension between Ust-Kut and the Talakan field already has been approved, while studies of the Tynda-Aldan and Talakan-Aldan segments and the Kozmino special seaport are to be assessed early this year.
On the supply side, Transneft last year authorized Urals Energy Public Co. Ltd.'s Dulisma oil field to be connected to the pipeline (OGJ Online, Nov. 14, 2006).
Contact Eric Watkins at [email protected].