Rosneft OJSC to commence construction of new drilling rigs in late 2015 - early 2016

Rosneft OJSC set to commence construction of new drilling rigs for development of Arctic fields in late 2015 – early 2016. According to IAA PortNews journalist, this was announced by Oleg Sochnev, Deputy Director of Environmental Safety and Technology Department, Rosneft, at the international conference SubSeaTECH 2014 in Saint-Petersburg. According to him, the concept of the programme for construction of drilling rigs is to be developed by the end of 2014. The programme implies the construction of both gravity drilling units for drilling at depth of up to 60 meters and floating units needed for deepwater operation.

"We cooperate a lot with Russian enterprises, in particular, with the Krylov State Research Center ", Rosneft representative said.

He added that the Company is to develop over 100 Arctic areas within a decade 10. Universitetskoye field in the Kara Sea (over meters deep) is the most promising field.

Rosneft has 46 licenses fro development of the fields within the limits of Russia’s continental shelf.