Translated material
Minor warnings
Rosprirodnadzor accuses ALROSA of violating licenses for the development of small deposits
Rosprirodnadzor has found another field where ALROSA does not comply with the terms of the license agreements . Last Thursday, the control agency filed claims against the diamond monopoly for failure to fulfill license obligations for the geological study and development of the Dalnyaya kimberlite pipe in Yakutia. And yesterday it became known that the ALROSA Investment Group (the “subsidiary” that manages the company’s non-diamond projects) also received criticism from officials due to violations during the development of the Irelyakh oil field in Yakutia. Rosprirodnadzor has already sent a proposal to the Rosnedra commission to revoke the license for this site.The Irelyakhskoye field is relatively small - total reserves barely exceed 9.7 million tons. It is located in the area of the main production sites of the diamond mining company. ALROSA acquired a license for it back in 1997 (valid until 2012) with the goal of building a small oil refining plant with a capacity of 250 thousand tons on the basis of this field. The deposit would be of some help and would guarantee the energy independence of diamond mining and the life of the region. According to the current project, the construction of the mini-refinery should be completed in 2009. At the end of last year, the former management of ALROSA even attracted a project loan worth 6 billion rubles from VTB and Societe Generale.
As the press service of Rosprirodnadzor told Vremya Novostei, the violations were identified during a repeated scheduled inspection. Its main goal was to establish what the company had done to eliminate the shortcomings identified by the previous raid of inspectors in May last year. Then employees of the local Rosprirodnadzor counted more than a dozen violations for 2003-2005, among which the most serious were a lag in production of almost 30%, the absence of some expert opinions, arrears in paying the mineral extraction tax, failure to meet deadlines for the introduction of mining and water injection wells, etc. The current inspection showed that the ALROSA subsidiary has already corrected most of them, with the exception of the most important thing - production volumes. If in 2005 the company produced 53.9 thousand tons instead of the planned 75 thousand, then in 2006 - only 61.6 thousand tons instead of 210 thousand. “The inspection act was signed on March 7, and last week we submitted a report on its results to Rosnedra,” explained the press service of Rosprirodnadzor.
ALROSA representatives were unavailable for comment yesterday. However, it can be assumed that it is simply not economically profitable for the company to produce more at the Irelyakhskoye field. After all, the field is designed to meet the company’s internal needs for petroleum products, which would be produced at a mini-plant, but it has not yet been built. If Irelyakhneft’s license is revoked, ALROSA will have to stop construction and look for either oil to load the mini-refinery, or another way to supply the diamond mining area with fuel.
At the Dalnyaya pipe, complaints about which were expressed by Rosprirodnadzor to ALROSA last week, production was not carried out, and the likelihood of revocation of this license will not affect the current activities of the company.
Such close attention of Rosprirodnadzor to the diamond monopolist has recently forced experts to put forward different versions regarding the true reasons for what is happening. On the one hand, after the state has seemingly settled the conditions for increasing its stake in ALROSA to a controlling stake, attempts to find violations in the company look strange. On the other hand, neither actually nor legally the state has yet become the controlling shareholder of the company, and with the resignation of Alexander Nichiporuk from the post of ALROSA president, it seems that it has even weakened its influence. After all, behind the new leadership of the monopoly, it is believed, is the President of Yakutia, Vyacheslav Shtyrov, who with difficulty agreed to strengthen the role of the federal center in the diamond mining company. So it is quite likely that Rosprirodnadzor’s claims regarding minor objects are just a warning about Moscow’s ability to find leverage on ALROSA’s management.
Rosprirodnadzor, however, is not yet inclined to dramatize the situation. “The results of the inspections make it possible to revoke these licenses, but given that previously the licenses for neither the Irelyakhskoye field nor the Dalnaya field were not included in the Rosnedra commission for revocation, ALROSA will most likely be given a period of three to six months to eliminate violations ", the department notes.