Sergei Mikhailov, deputy director of the ministry's fuel and energy department, was speaking at an international energy conference, CERAWeek-2007, being held in Houston.
Mikhailov said the adequate development of the system of oil and gas pipelines is based on the consistent implementation of such major pipeline projects as the Eastern Siberia-Pacific Ocean oil pipeline, the North European gas pipeline and the Burgas-Alexandroupolis oil pipeline.
Those projects are aimed at diversifying the export deliveries of Russia's raw materials to the world market and, consequently, to make them more reliable, Mikhailov said.
The Eastern Siberia-Pacific pipeline is slated to pump up to 1.6 million barrels per day of crude from Siberia to Russia's Far East, which will then be sent on to energy-hungry China and the Asia-Pacific region.
The first leg of the Eastern Siberia-Pacific project, operated by Russian state-owned oil pipeline monopoly Transneft, is expected to be completed in the second half of 2008. It will link Taishet, in the Eastern Siberian region of Irkutsk, to Skovorodino, in the Amur region, in Russia's Far East.
The second leg will involve the construction of a Skovorodino-Kozmino pipeline, to pump 367.5 million barrels per year, and the increase of the Taishet-Skovorodino pipeline's capacity to 588 million barrels.
The $10.5-billion North European Gas Pipeline project is designed to supply Western Europe with gas via a pipeline leading from Russia to Germany across the floor of the Baltic Sea.
The 280-kilometer (175-mile) pipeline in the Balkans will pump Russian oil to Europe, the U.S. and the Asia-Pacific region via the Bulgarian Black Sea port of Burgas and Greece's Alexandroupolis, on the Aegean.
Mikhailov said once those projects are completed by 2015, Russian crude will account for 20% of final consumption in the European Union, 5% in the Asia-Pacific region and 1% in the U.S.
