East Siberian oilfields are let off the Opec leash

Russia's remote eastern fields are ramping up as production shackles come off, but also to drive the growth that mature provinces can’t

Russia's icy east Siberian region looks set to further hot up as an oil production centre, boosting output both in the short term following the country's June agreement with Opec to relax production quotas; and in the more medium-term as its increasing output offsets declines in more mature basins. Rosneft, Russia's largest producer with a 40% share of the nation's crude output, is kickstarting several new east Siberian fields, having postponed start-ups in the wake of the November 2016 Russia-Opec deal. The Kremlin-controlled producer admitted in August that it had been increasing output since late May in anticipation of a relaxation of the pact. Rosneft alone has the capacity to increase o