Masimov: Kashagan to be launched in October

On Tuesday at the meeting of the Government the Prime Minister of Kazakhstan Karim Masimov re-reminded the country’s Ministry of Energy about the need to start the operation of the Kashagan field in October this year.

For the first time the need to resume the production at Kashagan in October rather than in December of this year was stated by the Prime Minister of Kazakhstan at the meeting of the Cabinet a week ago, on June 14. The largest deposit of Kazakhstan proved to be very "moody" – the production at it was stopped in September of 2013, two weeks after it began, due to gas leakage. Almost immediately after the resumption of the production another leak was discovered in October 2013. The analysis revealed the presence of numerous micro-cracks in the pipeline that appeared due to exposure of associated gas with a high sulfur content to the metal. In April 2014, the operator of the project North Consortium Caspian Operating Co (NCOC) confirmed the need for complete replacement of the gas and oil pipelines at the field, the total length of which is about 200 kilometers.