Ukraine has picked a consortium led by ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch Shell to develop its Skifska gas field in the Black Sea, it said on Wednesday, as it seeks to wean itself off increasingly expensive Russian gas imports. The project, whose total costs have been estimated by the government at $10-12 billion, is part of the former Soviet republic's plan to ease its dependence on gas imported from Russia, which amounted to some 40 billion cubic metres last year and accounted for nearly two thirds of the country's consumption.
"Thanks to state projects aimed at increasing domestic production we will be able to produce at least 45 billion cubic metres domestically," Environment and Natural Resources minister Eduard Stavitsky told reporters in announcing the winner of the Skifska tender.
Skifska, predominantly a gas field, is estimated to hold reserves of 200 to 250 bcm of gas, he said, and is expected to eventually produce 5 bcm a year. Stavitsky said the winning consortium, which also includes Romania's OMV Petrom and Ukrainian state company Nadra Ukrainy, would start work on the field this year. As a condition of the tender, which had also been contested by Russia's Lukoil, the winner must pay the government 2.4 billion hryvnias (about $300 million) after signing the 50-year production sharing agreement.