Our Arctic Neighbors: Yamal projects need foreign assistance

Russia’s Gazprom is considering inviting foreign partners to join it in a project to build an LNG plant on the Yamal Peninsula, the company’s CEO, Alexei Miller, told the London-based Financial Times in an interview June 26. The list of partners would include Shell, but “it is premature to speak about the final configuration of the project and the contribution of each partner,” Miller added.

Foreign workers are also needed for onshore oil and gas fields on the Yamal Peninsula, Dmitri Zayakin, the head of the regional association of employers, said recently. There are already 19,917 foreigners working in oil and gas projects in the region, 86 percent of whom are involved in construction projects. In 2008 the number of foreigners working in Yamal will increase to 22,560 and in 2009 to almost 29,000, according to Zayakin.

—Sarah Hurst