Kazakh oil output to rise with Kashagan after 2020

Kazakhstan expects annual oil output to reach as high as 100 million tonnes after 2020 when the giant Kashagan oilfield resumes pumping compared with less than 82 million this year.

Kazakhstan, already the second-largest oil producer after Russia among the former Soviet states, aims to produce 90 million to 100 million tonnes of oil starting in the third decade of this century, Kazakh Deputy Energy Minister Magzum Mirzagaliyev said.

“We are talking about the period after 2020 when Kashagan’s production stabilises,” he said.

The Kazakh government expects output to total 81.8 million tonnes this year and next. Kazakhstan produced 81.7 million tonnes in 2013. For January to September, output fell to 60 million tonnes from 60.5 million in the same period of 2013, official data show.

Production at the Kashagan reservoir, the world’s biggest oil find in recent times, started in September last year but was halted just a few weeks later after the discovery of gas leaks in the pipeline network of the $50 billion project.

Replacing the pipelines at the oilfield, which lies in the Caspian Sea off western Kazakhstan, will cost another $1.6 billion to $3.6 billion.