How oil production developed in Russia

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:41

The first written evidence of how oil was produced in Russia dates back to the 16th century. And already in 1745, the first oil refinery was built on the Ukhta River. The growing demand for a new type of fuel forced the tsarist government to send geological exploration expeditions to the Caucasus. The results were not long in coming. So, in 1823, an oil refinery appeared in the city of Mozdok, and in 1846, the world's first well was hammered in Baku. Thus began oil production in Russia. Statistics say that by 1900 our country was producing a third of the world's "black gold" market.

The revolution that began in 1917, and then the civil war, led to the decline of the once mighty empire. But already after 6 years, oil production in Russia was completely restored, and the country had already reached the pre-revolutionary level in terms of the volume of exported "black gold". Until the beginning of the Second World War, studies were carried out on oil reserves in the Caucasus region. During the Great Patriotic War, Hitler sought to seize the we alth of this region at any cost.

After the victory of the USSR over Germany, a decision was made to start geological exploration in the Volga-Ural region. Oil production in Russia graduallymoved from the eastern regions to the Urals. The presence of a relatively well-developed transport network, full-flowing rivers and the ease of developing new deposits led to a collapse in prices for Middle Eastern oil. The Volga-Ural region provided about 45% of all production in the USSR. By 1975 it had peaked at 4.5 million barrels/day.

The depletion of oil reserves in the Urals led to a more thorough development of Western Siberia. Large deposits discovered in the 1960s began to be actively developed. Thousands of Soviet citizens changed the climate of central Russia to the harsh Siberian winter. Cities and towns began to grow and develop rapidly. The rapid growth of oil-producing regions made it possible to increase the volume of "black gold" produced up to 9,900 thousand barrels per day. In our time, the Khanty-Mansi Autonomous Okrug remains a leader in oil production. After all, it is there that about 60% of all Russian "black gold" is mined. The first oil in Western Siberia was extracted by barbaric methods. They tried to compensate for the lack of exploration by more intensive drilling, which eventually led to the rapid depletion of wells and a decrease in production.

The collapse of the USSR led to the fact that oil production in Russia fell to such a limit that the country could only provide for itself, there was nothing left for export. The privatization carried out led to the creation of large oil companies. For many years Gazprom, Rosneft, Lukoil and TNK-BP have held the lead among them. Main oil and gas production in Russiacarried out by these giants.

Most oil companies are currently focused on the development of technologies that allow increasing the level of oil production in already developed regions. Modern automation tools and new methods of drilling lead to the fact that oil and gas production in Russia is only increasing. The total volume of proved reserves of black gold increased by 5-15% due to the modernization of production. New government programs aimed at developing the Far East and Eastern Siberia are already bearing fruit. Thanks to them, oil production in Russia continues to grow and exceeded 171 million tons.