Azernews.Az

By Aynur Jafarova

Kazakhstan's Oil and Gas Ministry expects the concept for expansion of the Karachaganak field to be developed by the year end, Kazakh Oil and Gas Minister Uzakbay Karabalin said at a press conference last week.

"We believe that the vision and concept of further expansion will be formed by the year end," he said.

According to Karabalin, the concept should be affordable both for investors and Kazakhstan.

"We have become more and more convinced that it is necessary to ensure the full injection of liquid gas to get maximum liquid hydrocarbons from this field," he noted.

According to Karabalin, Karachaganak is currently one of the top projects.

Karachaganak is one of the world's largest fields. Its oil reserves amount to 1.2 billion tons, while those of natural gas are 1.35 trillion cubic meters. Some 49 percent of Kazakhstan's gas production and 18 percent of oil production comes from this field.

Kazakhstan, Tengizchevroil to sign MoU

Karabalin said the Kazakh government and Tengizchevroil (TCO) intend to sign a memorandum of understanding.

"We have an agreement to sign a memorandum of understanding, which will reflect the key positions satisfying the Kazakh government with regard to the further development of this project," he said.

According to Karabalin, the draft memorandum includes important items, such as ecology and increasing the share of Kazakh content.

"Unprecedented steps will be taken within this project to increase the share of Kazakh content," he noted. "In particular, it will involve Kazakh companies working on the construction of steel entities, whose production capacity amounts to 60,000 tons of steel per year."

Karabalin said it is planned to increase share of Kazakh content in TCO to 32 percent of entire investment -- about $22-23 billion.

The TCO will fully provide raw material for the petrochemical complex, which is under construction in Atyrau region, he added.

He reminded that this memorandum will be adopted before commencement of a new project on the Tengiz field expansion.

"The Tengiz field expansion project is a very important project that will allow us to increase oil production by 12 million tons and reach the level of 36 million tons per year," he said.

The Tengiz oil field was discovered in 1979 and is one of the deepest and largest oil fields in the world. Reserves of the deposit are estimated at 750 million to 1.1 billion tons (6-9 billion barrels) of recoverable oil.

Oil production at Kahagan not to suspend in winter

Karabalin said that commercial oil production from the giant Kashagan field in Kazakhstan's section of the Caspian Sea will start in October and will not be suspended in winter period.

He reminded that it is necessary to produce at least 75,000 barrels per day for launching commercial oil production at the field. Currently this figure amounts to around 40,000 barrels per day.

"Around 8 million tons of oil is planned to be extracted at Kashagan in 2014," he said.

Kashagan is one of the largest fields discovered in the past 40 years. Recoverable oil reserves of Kashagan are estimated at 11 billion barrels, whereas total geological crude reserves stand at 35 billion barrels. Besides, natural gas reserves are estimated at over 1 trillion cubic meters.

The first well in the Kashagan field was reopened and first oil volumes were produced on September 11.

Earlier Kazakh officials said that it would take between three weeks and one month to launch commercial output from the field.