Kazakhstan’s Tengiz oil field expansion to create 20,000 jobs

THE implementation of the project to raise production at Kazakhstan’s huge Tengiz oil field will create more than 20,000 oil-related jobs in the country, according to the ministry of labour and social protection.

The company operating the Tengiz field, Tengizchevroil LLP, is implementing the Future Growth Project and Wellhead Pressure Management Project (FGP-WPMP), under which production is expected to increase by 12 million tonnes per year, or by 260,000 barrels per day. The WPMP plans to keep the existing Tengiz plants full by lowering the flowing well head pressures and boosting the pressure to the six existing processing trains, according to the company’s plans.

In July last year, Tengizchevroil — in which Chevron holds 50 per cent and ExxonMobil another 25 per cent — approved a $36.8 billion output expansion plan for Tengiz. Plans are to bolster production to 39 million tonnes of crude per year, or 850,000 barrels per day, by 2022. The field currently yields 27 million tonnes per year, which represents over a third of Kazakhstan’s overall crude oil output.

Kazakh Energy Minister Kanat Bozumbayev said back then that the expansion was expected to generate some $120 billion in extra taxes by the year 2033 when the oil field development contract ends, as well as a cumulative 250 million tons of crude.

Tengizchevroil — whose other shareholders include Kazakhstan’s state company KazMunayGaz with 20 per cent and Lukoil’s LukArco with a 5 per cent ownership — said that crude oil production was 114.8 million barrels for the first half of 2016. Estimated oil in place in the Tengiz field is around 25.5 billion barrels.

Total recoverable crude oil in the Tengiz and the nearby Korolev field is estimated at 6.4-10.7 billion barrels.

In 2015, Chevron’s share of the net daily production from the two fields averaged 257,000 barrels of crude oil, 348 million cubic feet of natural gas, and 21,000 barrels of natural gas liquids.