Sakhalin II

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Sakhalin II is a project for the production of natural gas and oil north of the Russian Pacific island Sakhalin in the Sea of ​​Okhotsk . It is operated by the international consortium Sakhalin Energy .

The project contained the world's largest facility for the production of liquefied natural gas at times and was the largest investment by foreign companies in Russia for several years.

history

Emergence

The project was launched in 1994 between the Russian government under President Boris Yeltsin and the Sakhalin Energy Investment Company Ltd. consortium . (SEIC) concluded as part of a Production Sharing Agreement . The consortium was founded by the Dutch-British energy company Royal Dutch Shell , the US companies Marathon and McDermott and the Japanese companies Mitsui and Mitsubishi .

Lenders for the project were the Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC), the US Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the US state-owned EximBank . The UK's State Export Credits Guarantee Department (ECGD) was considering support. The project should be refinanced through an agreement, according to which taxes are only paid to the Russian state when the gas is sold when the gas is sold ( product sharing mode ). By December 2006, about $ 12 billion had been invested.

The largest known undeveloped oil and gas reserves in the world were located off the island of Sakhalin . The total energy yield from Sakhalin has been estimated at a total of 700 million tons of oil and 2,500 billion cubic meters of gas. The oil and gas reserves developed by Sakhalin II were put at a calculated value of 4 billion barrels of oil, that is about 150-180 million tons of oil (over one billion barrels) and 500-800 billion cubic meters of gas, 9.6 million tons per year . For comparison: around 100 billion cubic meters of natural gas are used in Germany every year.

Production platforms were built in Piltun-Astochskoje and Lundkoje, as well as a network of pipelines that led over about 800 kilometers to the southernmost point of the island. There, the gas was to be converted into liquefied natural gas (LNG) in two plants .

Start of funding

In 1999, production began in Piltun-Astochskoje. Initially , the main customer countries were Japan , Korea and the USA . At the end of 2006, firm supply contracts were already in place for at least 98% of the gas production.

Since 2000, the consortium only consisted of Shell (55%), Mitsui (25%) and Mitsubishi (20%).

Environmental pollution

Various environmental organizations repeatedly protested against the project. The Association of the Indigenous Peoples of the Russian North complained that the pipelines running across the island and around 1000 rivers and streams endanger the most important spawning grounds for salmon if they leak . Salmon is the main food of the indigenous people of Sakhalin, a relatively seismically active region.

Even in the first phase of the project, the beginning of the drilling, Greenpeace also resisted the oil and gas production off the coast of Sakhalin, as it endangered the feeding grounds of the world's last population of only a hundred west Pacific gray whales . The WWF criticized Shell's failure to comply with whale protection requirements during the construction and operation of the offshore oil platforms.

The regional environmental organization Ökowacht Sakhalin ( Sakhalin Environment Watch ) presented a list of violations of the applicable environmental law in April 2006.

Intervention by the environmental authority

The "Rosprirodnadzor" environmental supervision office, which is subordinate to the Russian "Ministry of Natural Resources", and the regional water rights authority arranged for a subcontractor (the Starstroy company) to call in the public prosecutor's office, to withdraw a positive environmental report and the Cancellation of twelve required water law permits for the construction of the overland pipelines (phase 2 of the Sakhalin II project) and thus effectively stopped the construction work.

It was also criticized that huge amounts of industrial wastewater had been discharged into the sea from the “Molikpaq” oil platform. In addition, contrary to the regulations, SEIC did not check the possible dangers of abandoned boreholes and did not regularly report its water consumption to the environmental authority.

The Environment Agency announced in early December that it would file a lawsuit worth US $ 30 billion against Shell in March 2007 because the pipeline construction that had already begun had led to significant erosion problems, insufficient attention to geological hazards from flooding and trees had been illegally felled .

In various media analyzes, however, the real reason for the construction freeze is seen in the political influence of the Putin government .

Even the organization Greenpeace saw only a pretext in the Russian government's actions: As an indication of a connection, it is stated, for example, that the environmental permit was withdrawn exactly 15 days after Shell had drastically increased the project cost estimate (see below).

The reason for the influence is that "Sakhalin II" has so far been the only project in the region in which Russian companies were initially not involved and the Russian government under Vladimir Putin would like to retain or regain full state control over raw material stocks.

Gazprom participation

The largest Russian energy company Gazprom , which so far has the export monopoly for Russian natural gas, but has not yet been involved and has little technological experience in the liquefied gas business, had initially unsuccessfully sought a subsequent participation in the consortium. Gazprom wanted to acquire a blocking minority in SEIC and in return offered a 50% stake in another, as yet undeveloped Gazprom development project, the " Sapolarnoye - Neokom layer" in western Siberia , which is valued at over 3.3 trillion cubic meters of gas that Europe is supplied with natural gas.

Shortly afterwards, in the summer of 2005, however, supposedly without informing Gazprom in advance, Shell raised the estimate for the project development costs estimated at the time the contract was signed from 10 to 12 billion US dollars to around 20 to 22 billion US dollars by 2014. As a result, the planned time to break even was almost doubled, the Russian state only received its taxes much later, all shares were correspondingly less valuable and the investments had to be increased accordingly. The Russian authorities and Gazprom initially refused to agree to this increase and took the circumstance as an opportunity to demand a “reassessment” of the commitment, but no longer through product sharing, but in cash. Since Gazprom does not have enough of its own funds to develop new Russian gas reserves, it needs “hard” foreign investments.

At the beginning of July 2005, Shell and Gazprom accordingly agreed an exchange deal: In addition to numerous other detailed agreements, the core of the plan is that Shell will sell 25% of the shares at the end of 2006; In return, Shell will receive 50% of the "Sapolarnoje-Neokom" deposit from Gazprom, as proposed.

In addition, the exit from product-sharing mode means that the project will no longer be taxed with a delay and that a recently enacted law on Russian gas exports is now in effect. This may mean that the entire liquefied gas export of Sakhalin II is carried out by the state-owned company Gazprom.

In December 2006, Shell, Mitsui and Mitsubishi agreed to sell the majority of the SEIC shares to Gazprom for 7.45 billion US dollars (the equivalent of 5.66 billion euros). Shell reduces its stake to 27.5% (thus still retains a blocking minority ), Mitsui to 12.5% ​​and Mitsubishi to 10%, Gazprom thus receives 50% plus one stake. It was also agreed that the development investments would be increased by 3.6 billion US dollars, but would have to be borne by the original project partners alone, excluding Gazprom.

After this change in majority, Russian President Putin, who was personally present at the negotiations, declared that all environmental issues had now been settled.

LPG plant in operation

In 2009 the liquefied gas plant went into operation. It cools natural gas to −162 degrees Celsius, converts it into a liquid state and thus enables it to be transported by tanker. The procedure is laborious and rarely carried out.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Shell ceases to lead the world's largest funding project to Gazprom Deutsche Welle online from December 22, 2006
  2. English-language information page from SEW ( Memento of the original from February 18, 2006 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.sakhalin.environment.ru
  3. Russia is considering a $ 30 billion lawsuit against Shell In: Spiegel online dated December 12, 2006
  4. Dispute over the Sakhalin II oil and gas production project ( memento of the original from September 29, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. On: greenpeace.de from September 19, 2006 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.greenpeace.de
  5. Report by Gaseta, September 16, 2005, quoted from russland.RU ( Memento of the original of September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.russland.ru
  6. Archived copy ( Memento of the original from September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.russland.ru
  7. according to a report in the Russian newspaper Kommersant from the beginning of April 2005, quoted by russland.RU Archived copy ( memento of the original from September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.russland.ru
  8. Kommersant, quoted from russland.RU ( Memento of the original of September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.russland.ru
  9. Gazprom conquers gas field In: Handelsblatt of December 22, 2006
  10. Report from FTD ( Memento of February 14, 2007 in the Internet Archive )
  11. finanznachrichten.de, December 21, 2006
  12. Moscow and Tokyo in Gasrausch Eurasisches Magazin, 2009
  13. From prison island to energy paradise Neue Zürcher Zeitung, April 25, 2009

Coordinates: 52 ° 52 ′ 12 ″  N , 143 ° 46 ′ 12 ″  E