Gazprom ready to grow production capacity by winter
MOSCOW. Sept 7 (Interfax) - As winter approaches, Russian gas giant Gazprom plans to take gas extraction to plateau winter production of 1,600 million cubic meters per day with the possibility of peak production of 1,630 million daily m3, a source in Gazprom management told Interfax.
Ahead of winter, the company anticipates increasing extraction possibilities, and expectations are that capacity at existing deposits will make it possible to offset lower output at the aging giant deposits in the Nadym-Pur-Taz region.
The source pointed out that the issue here is accounting figures, and the real production will be determined by market need.
Last winter, Gazprom extracted a daily average of 1,586 million m3, with top production of 1,604 million m3 on December 5 last year. The previous winter brought record production of 1,668 million cubic meters (December 21, 2009), and the company average that winter was 1,633 million m3.
The introduction of fundamentally new production capacity - the Bovanenkov deposit - will happen next summer. During the fist year, the company should be producing just 7 billion m3 of gas. But the annual extraction decrease at the giant deposits will exceed 30 billion m3.
Gazprom will be unable to rush Bovanenkov deposit into production, as diverging from technological development schemes would inevitably lead to a drop in plateau production, the source said.
