Upstream reports that Lukoil is set to receive long-sought tax breaks
on oil from new North Caspian fields, similar to those competitors are getting
in East Siberia.
Russian energy
minister Sergei Shmatko said on 13 September that the government had prepared an
order relieving Lukoil of tax on exports from the new fields, and it was
awaiting Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's signature.
"The programme
(of tax breaks) was supported by the prime minister in principle. We are
expecting a decision in the near future," Shmatko said, adding Lukoil would
receive the same terms as competitors developing greenfields in East Siberia.
"We are not
going to apply a zero export duty but we have agreed to apply a similar
methodology (already applied to East Siberian deposits)," Shmatko said in a
Bloomberg report.
The announcement
came after Putin visited Lukoil's Norsi refinery in Nizhny Novgorod.
Unlike
greenfields in East Siberia being developed by Rosneft and TNK-BP, Lukoil's
Korchagin field in the Caspian Sea does not benefit from breaks on export
duties.
Lukoil has been
lobbying for export duty breaks for Korchagin after launching production there
in April and spending more than 40 billion roubles ($1.3 billion) over 15 years
to get it commissioned.
Analysts have
said tax breaks on exports from the technically challenging and investment-heavy
Caspian fields were crucial for the profitability of a company whose oil
production has been falling this year.
Lukoil plans to
launch the largest of its Caspian deposits, the Vladimir Filanovsky field, in
2014 or 2015.
Annual output
there was expected to reach 10.5 million tonnes.