The shareholders in the big Shtokman gas project in the Russian sector of the Barents Sea agreed at a meeting on Thursday to postpone a final investment decision until July 1, project operator Shtokman Development AG said in a statement.
It is the second postponement for the project in the last three months. Gazprom along with French Total and Norwegian Statoil had planned to give the project the final go-ahead before the end of 2011. But they decided at a year-end meeting to move back the deadline to the end of the first quarter of 2012.
Total and Statoil continue to await Russian government approval of the substantial tax breaks they say are needed to ensure the project is viable.
Gazprom has a 51% stake in Shtokman Development, Total has 25% and Statoil – 24%.
The Shtokman field is located some 600 kilometers northeast of Murmansk in waters up to 340 meters deep. The C1 resource in the license territory amounts to 3.8 trillion cubic meters of gas and 53.4 million tons of condensate.
