Petrom discovers gas and oil in Russia

Romania's largest company and the leader of the local oil market, Petrom, part of the Austrian OMV group, announced yesterday that it discovered gas and oil at the Lugovaya-1 exploration rig, located in the Saratov region in Russia, and the production registered in the first three exploitation layers amounts to some 6,500 barrels of oil equivalent per day (BOE/day), according to a company statement.

This could be the first concrete result of investments that Petrom has been making for some three years in Russia, after entering this market in 2006, through the acquisition of a majority package of 74.9 percent of Ring Oil Holding&Trading, estimated at $100 million.

"After the exploration stage, the oil field goes into the development stage, and only then into the so-called exploitation of these reserves, if experts agree that, economically speaking, it makes sense to continue investments because the money will be recovered," Petrom officials told Business Standard.

Petrom indicates that "the Lugovaya-1 rig was drilled down to 3,882 meters," and "the first tests are very encouraging, indicating a daily production rate of over 2,500 bbl of oil."

In the first three months of this year, Petrom produced 186,871 BOE daily. The company's current target for Exploration&Production (E&P) for 2010 is 210,000 BOE/day in Romania and 20,000 BOE/day at the international level.

money.ro