MOSCOW, May 12 (Reuters) - Russia's Sakhalin-2 liquefied
natural gas (LNG) plant will postpone some annual maintenance
work to 2021 due to logistic difficulties over the spread of the
coronavirus, a source familiar with the plans told Reuters on
Tuesday.
Russia's second-largest LNG plant after Novatek-led
Yamal LNG had initially planned to complete the work
this summer.
However, the source said the maintenance would be done
gradually, at one of two lines and start in June. The first
stage of the maintenance would last about a month, the source
said.
An official at Sakhalin Energy, the plant's operator, told
an inhouse newspaper last month that the maintenance plans were
revised due to the coronavirus outbreak and that each of the two
plant's lines would undergo the work separately, not together as
it had been planned.
He did not provide a schedule for the maintenance. Sakhalin
Energy, when contacted by Reuters, has not announced the dates.
The plant is located on the Pacific island of Sakhalin,
which has had a relatively low number of coronavirus cases - 41
in total - as of May 11.
LNG production at the Sakhalin-2 plant last year fell to
around 11.15 million tonnes from 11.41 million tonnes in 2018.
Equity holders in Sakhalin Energy include Gazprom,
Royal Dutch Shell, and Japan's Mitsui and
Mitsubishi Corp.
(Reporting by Vladimir Soldatkin; editing by Katya Golubkova
and Jason Neely)
