Oil spill on ESPO planned to remove completely by January 28.

MOSCOW, January 21 (Itar-Tass) - About 150 cubic meters of oil spilled
from the Eastern Siberia - Pacific Ocean (ESPO) oil pipeline have been
removed so far. More than 2,000 square meters of contaminated area has
been cleared up, the press service of the Far Eastern regional center of
the Russian Emergency Situations Ministry said.

All works to eliminate the emergency situation on the ESPO pipeline
are planned to complete on January 28, the press service said.
About 450 cubic metres of oil leaked from the ESPO on the area of
about 20,000 square meters in the territory of Yakutia. The oil spill was
spotted in the patrolling of the pipeline, 30 kilometers from the Lensk
city on January 20.
There is no hazard to the population, the petroleum products' transfer
into water bodies is also excluded, as the oil is thick and cannot spread.
The emergency situation regime in the Lensk region is lifted.
The oil spill cleanup operation involves 196 people and 40 machinery
units.
The ESPO is a pipeline system for exporting Russian crude oil to the
Asia-Pacific markets (Japan, China, Korea).
The original project of this pipeline was proposed by Russian oil
company Yukos in 2001 as an independent oil pipeline. The project proposed
to build a pipeline from Angarsk, where Yukos operated a refinery, to
Daqing in northern China. At the same time, Transneft proposed the
alternative project to pipe oil from Taishet in the Irkutsk region to the
Far East port of Nakhodka. In May 2003, the Russian government decided to
combine these projects and that Transneft would be in charge of the
pipeline, while Yukos would supply the oil. On 29 May 2003, Russia and
China signed an agreement on the construction of the pipeline.
The pipeline's construction started in April 2006. On October 4, 2008,
the section between Taishet and Talakan was launched in a reverse to pump
oil from Surgutneftegaz-owned Alinsky deposit. The first stage of the
pipeline was completely laid in May 2009 and the whole first stage was
reversed in December 2009. The terminal at Kozmino was inaugurated by
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on 28 December 2009.
In February 2009, Russia and China signed a deal according to which
the spur pipeline to China would be built and Russia would supply China
with 15 million tonnes of oil (300,000 barrels per day) each year for 20
years in exchange for a loan worth $25 billion to Russian companies
Transneft and Rosneft for pipeline and oil fields development. The
construction of the spur line to China started in the Russian territory on
April 27, 2008 and in Chinese territory on May 18, 2009.
The ESPO-1 will operate up to commissioning the second stage of the
project.
The second stage of the ESPO pipeline will run through the Amur
region, the Jewish Autonomous Region, Khabarovsk and Primorsky
territories. With the commissioning of the second stage of the ESPO the
capacity of the system will grow to 80 million tonnes annually.

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