courtesy Caspian Services

A major oil-and-gas-condensate field has been discovered at Tsentralnaya structure in the Caspian by a joint venture of LUKOIL and Gazprom, the oil majors have announced.

The oil-bearing structure lies in the Russian part of the central Caspian Sea by the border with Kazakhstan.

The first exploration wildcat hit hydrocarbons, and then testing produced sweet crude in commercial flows without mechanical aids. A 3D seismic study is due in short order.

A deal Russian-Kazakh deal of 2002 puts the Tsentralnaya structure under Russian rulemaking, but the field’s volumes will be shared by the steppe neighbours.

The discovery is timely for Gazprom which has been criticized for failing to boost reserves via new discoveries and for relying too much on company buy-ups to replace reserves.

Tags: Gazprom, Lukoil