Russia's oil pipelines are one of the keycomponents of the fuel and energy sector of the economy. Today, an extensive network of oil pipelines, gas pipelines and oil product pipelines of various significance is functioning in the Russian Federation. Pipeline transport links the territories of most subjects of the Federation, and also serves to export hydrocarbons and their products.
Pipeline classification
Pipelines are divided according to their purpose:
- Local connect objects within the field, oil and gas storage facilities, oil refineries.
- Regional pipelines have a lengthseveral tens of kilometers. They connect oil fields with the main station, with points of loading of oil (loading) on water or railway transport, the main pipeline.
- Trunk - pipelines with a length of over50 km, with a diameter of pipes from 200 mm to 1400 mm and above. The distance to which products can flow through such pipelines is measured in hundreds or thousands of kilometers. Pumping is carried out not by one compressor station, but by several ones located along the pipeline route. Depending on the oil product being pumped, the main pipeline is called the oil pipeline (pumping crude oil), the product pipeline (oil products), the fuel oil pipeline, the gas pipeline, the kerosene pipeline, etc.
The main pipelines operate continuously, their short-term stop is possible in case of an accident, repair or scheduled replacement of parts.
Development of oil pipelines in Russia
The history of the development of pipelines in Russiainherently associated with the development of the oil industry. In 1901, the state produced almost half of the total world oil production. With the increase in the volume of raw materials, the issue of its transportation has increasingly been raised. To reduce the workload of railways and reduce the cost of transportation, the economic feasibility of building pipelines was justified.
Russia's first trunk oil pipelines1147 km long were built at the turn of the XIX and XX centuries and connected the industries in the vicinity of Baku with oil refineries. The initiative to build the first product pipeline belonged to D.I. Mendeleev. The plan was implemented in 1906. The product pipeline with a length of 831 km, a pipe size of 200 mm and 13th compressor stations was the largest in the world at that time and supplied kerosene from Baku to Batumi for subsequent export.
In the prewar years, the main flows of oil andpetroleum products accounted for the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus and the Volga basin. The Grozny-Tuapse oil pipelines (649 km, diameter 273 mm), Ishimbay-Ufa (169 km, 300 mm) and the Mangyshlak-Samara and Ust-Balyk-Almetyevsk pipelines were commissioned.
A new round of development of oil pipelines in Russia (thenUSSR) received in the postwar years. The peak occurred during the period of rapid development of oil production and refining in the Volga-Ural basin and the development of Siberian fields. Trunk pipelines of considerable length with a diameter of up to 1,200 mm were built. Thanks to some of them (for example, Surgut - Polotsk), Siberian oil began to be delivered to the central regions of Russia, Belarus and the Baltic States.
Advantages of pipeline transport
Наиболее интенсивное развитие нефтепроводы и Russian gas pipelines were received in the second half of the 20th century. Today, in terms of the volume and specific gravity of the hydrocarbons transported, pipeline transport is steadily replacing rail and water transport of oil and petroleum products. The main advantages of oil and gas pipelines are:
- Significant pumping distance, uninterrupted operation, significant throughput, minimal losses.
- Wide range of viscosity of pumped oil products.
- Stable work in different climatic zones.
- The possibility of building pipelines in virtually any area.
- High level of mechanization in construction.
- Automation of process control systems.
The main disadvantage of pipeline transportation is considered to be quite large investments at the construction stage.
Russia's largest oil pipelines
- Baku - Novorossiysk - an oil pipeline for transporting Caspian oil to the port of Novorossiysk.
- Balakhany - Black City is the first oil pipelineRussia, commissioned in 1878. The pipeline connects the Balakhani field on the Absheron Peninsula and the oil refining facilities in the vicinity of Baku.
- Baltic pipeline network. Design capacity - 74 million tons of oil per year. It connects the sea port of Primorsk with oil fields in Western Siberia and the Ural-Volga region.
- Eastern Siberia - Pacific Ocean - pipeline,connecting the Siberian fields with the bulk port of Kozmino near Nakhodka. The operator of the pipeline is Transneft, JSC. The length of 4,188 km makes it possible to export Russian oil to the markets of the Asia-Pacific region and the USA.
- Oil pipeline "Friendship" - the largest in the worldtrunk pipeline system built to supply oil and oil products to the socialist states of Eastern Europe. Now it is operated for export deliveries to Europe.
- Grozny - Tuapse - the first Russian main oil pipeline of medium diameter, built in the early twentieth century to transport Caucasian oil to the Black Sea coast.
- The Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) connects fields in western Kazakhstan with a terminal on the Black Sea coast near Novorossiysk.
- The Murmansk pipeline with a capacity of 80 million tons connects the oil fields of Western Siberia and the seaport of Murmansk.
- Surgut - Polotsk is an oil pipeline connecting Western Siberia with Belarus and then the Baltic countries and Poland.
- One-of-a-kind heated main oil pipeline Uzen - Atyrau - Samara.
Export through pipelines
Currently on Russian oil pipelinesaccounted for 84% of oil exported outside the country. The remaining 13% is accounted for by rail and 3% by water and river transport. OJSC AK Transneft is the only company operating oil pipelines in Russia. It accounts for 97% of all transported oil produced in the country. The length of the company's pipeline system is more than 217 thousand km, which connects the main regions of oil production in Russia with the sales markets in Europe. Of the total transport system, 46.7 thousand km are oil pipelines and 19.3 thousand km are oil pipelines.
The main oil pipelines of Russia involved in the export:
- Baltic oil pipeline, throughput - 74 million tons per year;
- Pipeline system "Friendship". One of the branches of this highway goes to Poland, the second - to Slovakia. Total throughput - 90 million tons;
- Black Sea oil pipelines - 43 million tons
The most promising direction for the development of Russian oil exports is East Siberian, due to the brisk growth in oil consumption in China.
