Pipeliners

26 July 2007 - Upstream OnLine - Work on a section of the onshore oil and gas pipelines of Russia's Sakhalin 2 project has been suspended on the orders of regional technical watchdog Sakhalin Rostekhnadzor, the agency said today. Sakhalin Rostekhnadzor, which is responsible for industrial safety and environmental protection on the Russian island, said it had halted the work due to violations in pipeline construction across an active seismic fault. Reuters quoted Rostekhnadzor as saying that the Sakhalin Energy consortium operating the project "digressed from project decisions on construction of a drainage system on active seismic faults and used the pipes which were not planned by the project". Sakhalin Energy, co-run by Russia's gas monopoly Gazprom and Shell, said the interruption was linked to routine procedure of getting expert approvals for the project and would not affect the whole project's schedule. "Some improvements were included in the design documentation, and they need to be approved now by independent experts," Sakhalin Energy spokesman Ivan Chernyakhovsky told the news agency. "The expert work is being done at the moment, and we will resume the construction as soon as it is over," he added. Chernyakhovsky said that the section was 800 metres long and work on other sections of the 800 kilometre pipeline was continuing as normal. Rostekhnadzor said the suspension will not be lifted "until Sakhalin Energy rectifies the violations during the drainage system construction". The oil and gas pipelines run in parallel down the length of Russia's remote Sakhalin island off the Pacific coast to a liquefied natural gas plant. The pipelines faced intense scrutiny from Rostekhnadzor and Russia's environmental agency last year. The pressure contributed to a decision by Shell to cede control of the huge project to Gazprom, Russia's state-controlled gas monopoly. Shell's share in the project halved to 27.5% after Gazprom bought a 50% stake from Shell and its Japanese partners, Mitsui and Mitsubishi, which now hold 12.5% and 10% each, respectively. While government pressure has quickly receded after the state-controlled gas giant entered the project, local environmentalists insist that violations are continuing. Last week, a leading geologist claimed that Sakhalin 2 oil and gas pipeline construction work was causing environmental damage. Nikolai Kazakov, deputy director of the Russian Academy of Sciences' Far Eastern Geological Institute, told Reuters inspections conducted in June along the pipelines revealed "the development of hazardous exogenous processes". In a letter to the Sakhalin administration, Kazakov said that "the anti-erosion measures do not ensure the protection of waterways from soil run-off along the oil and gas pipeline route, which has been contaminated by the work of heavy equipment during pipe-laying", Reuters reported The letter also stated that contamination increased as a result of the development of erosion and landslide processes in the mountain slope sections of river and stream valleys. Sakhalin Energy has repeatedly said all project work is strictly in line with environmental regulations.