The drill involved the CPC-R Central Region staff, as well as managing bodies and resources of the Republic of Kalmykia territorial subsystem of the Unified State Emergency Prevention and Response System. The total of more than 200 persons and 45 vehicles were involved in the drill.
According to the drill script, at 6 a.m. SCADA detected “a leak” at KP 952 of the trunk oil pipeline. A dispatcher of the CPC OCC (Novorossiysk) shut down conventionally the pump stations and isolated remotely the suspected emergency section of the trunk oil pipeline.
A Security operative group started for the “emergency» site and found a conventional oil spill caused by unauthorized earthwork in the Tengiz-Novorossiysk trunk oil pipeline exclusion zone. It was established that oil flowed along the adjacent terrain towards the Manych river.
The incident was promptly reported to the Consortium Management and regional internal affairs authorities. Further on, work proceeded in line with the earlier developed emergency response plans. In the course of the drill, the CPC units and Emergencies Ministry resources engaged in oil spill containment and response received an additional scenario: ignition of spilt oil injuring two firemen. The Disaster Medicine Service provided medical aid to the injured and evacuated them to medical institutions.
The CPC units also practiced restoration of oil pipeline integrity, containment of spilt oil, including installation of booms, erection of earth dikes, dams, retaining walls, as well as oil and contaminated soil collection by mechanized and manual methods. Besides, the emergency services conducted training in erection of temporary tanks and deployment of oil skimmers, spraying of sorbent, performance of express analysis and sampling of soil for oil products.
The performance was highly praised by the observers: all operations were completed on time, the CPC staff and contractors (ООО Starstroi, АО TsАSEО and others) demonstrated full readiness and availability of all resources required for prompt emergency response.
The tasks of notification, management and interaction were fulfilled successfully by the CPC units, including the Process/Environmental Monitoring Group, the Republic of Kalmykia General Authority, RF Emergencies Ministry and the republican environmental authorities.
Such large-scale drills are conducted by CPC on a regular basis, permitting to assess readiness of the CPC operations units, repairmen, Security and dispatchers for abnormal situations.
About CPC:
CPC pipeline system is one of the largest investment projects in the energy industry with participation of foreign capital in the CIS. The length of the pipeline connecting oil fields in Western Kazakhstan with the Marine Terminal near Novorossiysk is 1,511 km. CPC Marine Terminal is equipped with single point moorings which allow for safe tanker loading at a considerable distance from the shore, also when the weather conditions are unfavorable.
CPC Shareholders: Russian Federation (represented by Transneft – 24% of and CPC Company – 7%) – 31%; Republic of Kazakhstan (represented by KazMunayGaz – 19% of and Kazakhstan Pipeline Ventures LLC – 1.75%) – 20.75%; Chevron Caspian Pipeline Consortium Company - 15%, LUKARCO B.V. – 12.5%, Mobil Caspian Pipeline Company – 7.5%, Rosneft-Shell Caspian Ventures Limited – 7.5%, BG Overseas Holding Limited - 2%, Eni International N.A. N.V. - 2% of and Oryx Caspian Pipeline LLC – 1.75%.