Oil and condensate production decreased by 1.4% in seven months of 2020, Kazakhstan’s Energy Minister Nurlan Nogayev told a government meeting on August 11.

“Production of oil and condensate amounted to 51.5 million tonnes in the first seven months of this year. This is 1.4% lower compared to the same indicator in 2019,” the head of energy ministry said.

According to Nogayev, oil exports amounted to 42 million tonnes – an increase of 0.4%. Gas production for seven months of this year amounted to 33.4 billion cubic metres – an increase of 1% compared to the same period last year, Nogayev added.

Earlier, Kazakhstan Prime Minister Askar Mamin said the decline in oil production is explained by the need to fulfill the agreements reached by OPEC+.

Meanwhile, US-Kazakh joint venture TengizChevroil (TCO) said on August 11 crude production in the first half of 2020 was 14.26 million metric tonnes (112.51 million barrels). In 2019, crude production was 28.6 million metric tonnes. “In the first half 2020, TCO sold over 725,000 metric tonnes of LPG, 3.9 billion cubic metres of dry gas and over 1.3 million tonnes of sulfur,” the press service of TengizChevroil said.

According to company, in the first half of 2020, direct payments to Kazakhstan totaled $3.9 billion. In 1H 2020, TCO spent $2 billion on Kazakh goods and services, including $1.4 billion for FGP (future growing project). TCO has invested more than $34.9 billion on Kazakh goods and services since 1993.

“From 1993 through 1H 2020, TCO made direct financial payments of over $150 billion to Kazakhstani entities,” the press service added.

Tengiz, the world’s deepest producing super giant oil field, was discovered in 1979. The Tengizchevroil (TCO) partnership was formed on April 6, 1993, between Kazakhstan and Chevron. Current partners are Chevron, 50%; KazMunayGas, 20%; ExxonMobil Kazakhstan Ventures, 25%; LukArco, 5%. Estimated oil in place in the Tengiz field is 3.2 billion metric tonnes (25.5 billion barrels) with 200 million metric tonnes (1.6 billion barrels) in the Korolev field.

Total recoverable crude oil in the Tengiz and Korolev fields is estimated to be 890 million to 1.37 billion metric tonnes (7.1 to 10.9 billion barrels). The areal extent of the Tengiz reservoir is large, measuring 20 kilometres by 21 kilometres.

TCO completed its Sour Gas Injection and Second-Generation Plant (SGI/SGP) expansion project in 2008, which brought daily production capacity to approximately 75,000 metric tonnes per day (600,000 barrels) of crude oil and 22 million cubic metres per day (750 mmscf) of natural gas.