New field to ship oil on Northern Sea Route

When Gazprom Neft’s Novoportovskoye oil field in the southeast of the Yamal Peninsula, in the Russian Arctic, comes on line in 2015, the field will transport its oil production through the Northern Sea Route, Russia’s marine transportation corridor around the country’s Arctic coast, according to a report in the Barents Observer. With winter sea ice up to two meters thick and an ice-free season that lasts only around three months in the waters adjacent the new field, tankers shipping oil from the field’s marine terminal will require assistance from icebreakers, the Barents Observer says.

And the export of oil from the Novoportovskoye field will cause a major increase in the shipment of oil through Russia’s Arctic waters, the Barents Observer says. The field is thought to hold 1.6 billion barrels of oil and 9 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Gas from the field would be shipped by pipeline, through Gazprom’s pipeline network.

—Alan Bailey