Russia’s Trasneft says to launch ESPO-2 pipeline by end of 2012
Russia’s oil pipeline monopoly Trasneft plans to launch the second line of the Eastern Siberia - Pacific Ocean (ESPO) pipeline by the end of 2012 - supposedly in December - the company said on Monday after Vedomosti business paper reported that the project would likely be postponed, PRIME reports.
The paper said Transneft failed to agree on land acquisition documents with the Amur Region, where the pipeline will be laid.
Transneft said the Amur Region government was dragging its feet with the documents to force the company to sign an agreement aimed at helping with the economic development of the region.
“The company intends to not only launch the ESPO-2 by the end of 2012, but also to continue meeting its social liabilities on the construction of housing, reconstruction, and investment in hospitals, schools and kinder gardens,” Transneft said in a statement, adding that it planned to pay 1.5 billion rubles in taxes to the regional budget this year.
The ESPO runs from the Irkutsk Region in East Siberia via the republic of Sakha (Yakutia) in the north of Russia to the town of Skovorodino in the Amur Region in the country’s Far East. Transneft has said that presidential envoy in the Far Eastern Federal District Viktor Ishayev has been critical of the ESPO for not benefitting the Amur Region. Transneft said it planned to invest four billion rubles into building housing, roads, social, and cultural sites in the region by 2014.
The first line of the ESPO was launched in late 2009. The construction of ESPO-2 and the extension of ESPO-1 will require 110–115 billion rubles, the company said.
