MOSCOW (MRC) -- Lukoil, Russia's second-largest crude producer, said it had fully replaced oil and gas reserves in 2012 thanks to acquisitions and the upward revision of figures for the Caspian Sea region and Komi Republic, said Upstreamonline.
Like other Russian producers, Lukoil is facing a depletion of reserves and a decline in production at its deposits in West Siberia.
The company said that proven hydrocarbon reserves totalled 17.3 billion barrels of oil equivalent, including 13.4 billion barrels of oil and 23.5 trillion cubic feet of gas as of end-December, almost unchanged from the previous year under the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) system of classification.
Lukoil has been pursuing a strategy of global expansion, given the competition at home from state-controlled energy companies including larger rival Rosneft. The largest shareholders in Lukoil are its president Vagit Alekperov and his deputy Leonid Fedun.
The company is developing the giant West Qurna-2 oilfield in Iraq and has also been exploring in West Africa.
Under Petroleum Resources Management System (PRMS) criteria, its resources totalled 10.3 billion barrels of oil equivalent by the end of last year, the company said.
As MRC wrote earlier, in late January 2013 a fire triggered by a release of hydrocarbons was reported to have broken out earlier this week at a Lukoil-operated field in the Timan-Pechora region of Russia. Company officials said the blaze did not result in any damage to the local environment. Russia's environmental watchdog Rosprirodnadzor has now launched an investigation of the incident.
Lukoil is Russia's second largest oil company and its second largest producer of oil. Headquartered in Moscow, Lukoil is the second largest public company (next to ExxonMobil) in terms of proven oil and gas reserves. The company has operations in more than 40 countries around the world.
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