ST PETERSBURG, Russia (Reuters) - Russian gas monopoly Gazprom will name its foreign partners for the huge Shtokman gas project "this summer," Energy Minister Viktor Khristenko said on Thursday, signaling a further delay.
Gazprom has shortlisted five firms as possible partners for the $20 billion project: U.S. firms ConocoPhillips and Chevron, France's Total and Norway's Statoil and Hydro.
Gazprom wants to choose two or three partners for the project but has repeatedly delayed the final announcement from the first quarter of 2006 saying it needed more time to analyze the proposals on how to tap the Arctic Barents Sea field.
The most recent delay came on Wednesday, when Gazprom deputy head Alexander Ryazanov said in Tashkent the announcement was delayed from mid-May until the end of the month. He also said that recent criticism of Russia by U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney will not affect the choice of partners for Shtokman.
Cheney said earlier this month that Moscow was playing power politics with its vast energy resources and warned against any attempt to turn oil and gas into tools of intimidation or blackmail.
Gazprom, the world's largest gas producer, which supplies Europe with a quarter of gas needs, plans to make Shtokman its key platform for shipping liquefied natural gas to the United States. Located under the stormy and iceberg-strewn Barents Sea, 550 km from Russia and Norway, Shtokman, the field has reserves of around 3.7 trillion cubic meters of gas.
Analysts have said they expected at least one of the Norwegian firms to make the final line-up, with Total least favored to be picked, although Gazprom's secrecy about what each is offering it in return has made it a tough guessing game.
Discovered in 1988, the field was meant to be onstream as early as 2000, but the project has been repeatedly postponed as Gazprom lacked funds and was unable to agree with Western companies on the financing.
