Siberia oilfield is nuke blast site
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A SIBERIAN oilfield that Russia and China plan to develop together was the site of Soviet nuclear blasts in the 1970s and 1980s, Russian officials confirmed yesterday.
The Russian government and state oil firm Rosneft said the field was safe, rejecting environmentalists' concerns that oil extracted from it could be contaminated with radiation.
At least seven "peaceful" nuclear detonations were performed at the Srednebotuobinskoye oilfield, according to a report published by the environment ministry of the Republic of Sakha, a remote region in Eastern Siberia also known as Yakutia.
"Yes, indeed, there were nuclear explosions performed at the site," a ministry spokeswoman said from the city of Yakutsk.
No radiation leaks were reported, she said.
Blasts at the field were intended to increase flows from oil-bearing rock and, in one case, create a storage reservoir. Rosneft said that it regularly monitors radiation at the blast sites — now mothballed — in areas where it holds production licences.
"Radiological examination of the deposits and the production extracted from them shows that no radionuclides have reached the surface, including in the oil," it added.
The company last week signed a joint venture memorandum with China National Petroleum Corp to develop the 1-billion-barrel oilfield.
CEO Igor Sechin signed an agreement this week that would raise Rosneft's exports to China to more than 1 million barrels per day.
The deals reflect President Vladimir Putin's drive to pivot Russia's energy export strategy eastward, away from Europe's stagnating market and to the more dynamic Asia-Pacific region.
Environmental experts expressed concern that oil extracted from the field could contain radioactive elements.
"Any nuclear explosion resembles what happens in a reactor — and the blasts at Chernobyl and Fukushima," said Vladimir Chuprov, a nuclear expert at Greenpeace Russia, referring to the reactor disasters in Ukraine and Japan.
"The results are the same: the emission of radionuclides, including strontium-90 and caesium.
"There is a risk that the oil will be contaminated."
The Ministry of Natural Resources in Moscow, which issues licences to develop mineral resources, ruled out any danger.
"We analyze all the risks, including radioactive ones. If a field has been allocated for development, that means we consider there to be no risks," spokesman Nikolai Gudkov said.
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