Belarus’ proven oil reserves close to 50m tonnes

The volume of proven oil reserves in Belarus is close to 50 million tonnes, BelTA learned from Sergei Kamornikov, Deputy Director General of the Belarusian industrial group Belorusneft, during the conference held on 24 September to discuss production, trading, and retail aspects of the market of oil products and natural gas in the Republic of Belarus.

Belorusneft’s representative noted: “We preserve the strategic oil reserves. At present we have about 50 million tonnes of proven and recoverable oil.” In his words, it is inadvisable to increase oil extraction at present, this is why oil extraction is kept at 1.645 million tonnes per annum.

Sergei Kamornikov said that Belorusneft is now primarily focused on taking part in international projects in Russia, Ecuador, and Venezuela. “For now the bulk of the effort is channeled into working with these countries since there are no plans to greatly increase oil extraction in Belarus in the near future,” he explained.

As many as 58 oil deposits were in use in Belarus in 2015. As of 1 September Belarus had 778 wells, including 712 operating ones. A retooling program is in progress to keep up oil extraction figures. The program provides for buying drilling equipment, geophysical and oilfield equipment for building and repairing wells, for improving the technology used to extract viscous oil, for intensifying the development of low-yield oil deposits.