Gazprom Flexes Muscles
Industry analysts say that future development on the Yamal peninsula, the world’s largest area of reindeer husbandry, will dwarf Shtokman, another giant deposit, located in the stormy Barents Sea. Yamal holds around one third of Gazprom’s reserves, or more than 10 trillion cubic metres. Thanks to these reserves, Gazprom have been flexing their muscles towards foreign investors who want a piece of the pie. Petro Canada would appear to be offering swappable assets in heavy oil which lie in the tar sands of Canada’s western province Alberta. Recent reports that Gazprom is moving into the Niger delta were met with much concern in the western media. Gazprom also announced investments of 20 billion for next year, most of which will go toward the Bovanenkov and Kharasavei fields on Yamal, the firm’s next source of big gas output, and Shtokman on the Barents Sea. More funds will also be invested in new pipelines to connect Yamal to the existing system of trunk pipelines, which also needs to be expanded, Gazprom said to Reuters last week.
The oil sands development has been controversial in that it is an extremely destructive process which has reaked havoc on the health and water quality of aboriginal inhabitants of the region, and other communities downstream. The tar sands development (in which Statoil is also an investor) is being cited as a reason to develop the MacKenzie Valley pipeline, a 1200 km pipeline that plans to connect northern offshore gas fields with North American markets. The pipeline has also been controversial and is still in a review process. Reindeer (herding in the MacKenzie Delta dates back to the early 20th Century) and wild caribou will be impacted by this pipeline.
