Chinese oil-refining consortium Sinopec and Russian counterpart Rosneft have finalized a deal, which will see them jointly explore and develop the Venin offshore deposit, an arm of the Sakhalin-3 project in the Far East region of Russia.

 

The accord would follow a 74.9/25.1 stake with Rosneft claiming the larger share, the Itar-Tass news agency reported yesterday.

 

The rich Venin deposit has been estimated to contain reserves stretching to 169.4 million tons of oil and 258.1 billion cubic meters of gas.

 

Its Venin shelf in the Sea of Okhotsk encompasses 5,300 sq km, with six promising sites so far ready to be explored.

 

Rosneft and Sinopec's collaboration to this end began on August 30, 2005 with an agreement on interim financing. By January 1, 2007, total investment for the project had reached US$69.8 million.

 

(Xinhua News Agency March 30, 2007)