Russian state-run oil and gas company Gazprom will start production drilling at the Kovyktinskoye gas field in the Irkutsk Oblast (Russia) in 2019. The field is moving from the development stage to full-scale production and will be the flagship asset of the Irkutsk gas production center.
Gas production from the field will be fed into the 38 bcm/year Power of Siberia (PoS) gas pipeline in late 2022 and will supply the Chinese market. More specifically, production from the Kovyktinskoye gas field will be shipped via a 800 km long section heading to the Chayandinskoye gas field (Yakutia) and then through a 2,200 km section running from Chayandinskoye to Blagoveshchensk (Chinese border).
Gas supplies via the Power of Siberia gas pipeline will start in December 2019 under the framework of a 30-year supply and purchase agreement between China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) and Gazprom.