Pipeliners

VLADIVOSTOK, Russia, Feb 25 (AFP) - Russia will not change the site for an oil terminal of its vital pipeline linking Siberian oil fields and the Pacific despite ecological and popular protest, a top Russian official said Friday. "Choosing the Perevoznaya bay as the end point for the pipeline is the Russian government's decision, and there will be no further discussion or consideration of other alternatives," chief of Russia's sea and river transport agency Vyacheslav Ruksha said. Ecologists argued that Perevoznaya, only 50 kilometers (30 miles) south of Vladivostok, was dangerously close to the Far East's major national parks and could prove a disaster for the coast and Vladivostok's one-million population. The WWF wildlife protection fund and local non-governmental organisations assembled over 4,000 signatures to protest the terminal's construction in Perevoznaya, suggesting instead that the terminal be moved to the port of Nakhodka or the Strelok bay. However, Ruksha assured that the terminal would be environmentally safe, "as it will be fitted with effective waste disposal equipment that has already been tested in similar terminals in Novorossiisk and Primorsk." The 4,118-kilometer (2,559-mile) pipeline will run from Taishet in Siberia's Irkutsk region to Perevoznaya, with 44 oil-pumping stations in between, and could transport up to 80 million tonnes a year for shipments to China, Japan, South Korea, Indonesia and Australia. The project is estimated to cost 15 billion dollars (nine billion euros) although some analysts have forecast a price of 16 billion dollars and possibly more. Japan and China -- both starving for future energy supplies -- have fought furiously for the right to access Russia's untapped oil reserves. Tokyo won the upper hand after a protracted diplomatic battle when the Russian government late last year sided with the more expensive but potentially more profitable Pacific coast option. Tokyo has offered to provide seven billion dollars in soft loans for the pipeline and make further investments in Far Eastern Russia, which has been shunned by Japanese companies because the two nations have yet to sign a peace treaty ending World War II due to a lingering border dispute. vn-cal/bm