Gazprom Neft CEO Alexander Dyukov has confirmed what energy analysts have long suspected: Russia is running out of cheap oil. The country is being forced to tap into so-called “hard-to-recover” reserves—deep, complex, and geologically intractable deposits that require expensive extraction methods, advanced technology, and massive government support.
If oil prices remain at current levels, Moscow could lose half of its production by 2030. These figures may sound sensational, but this is the new reality. The fields the Kremlin is now actively exploiting were discovered in the 1980s—and they are already 90–95% depleted. New reserves will never be as profitable, which could lead the Kremlin toward complete bankruptcy.
As was already said today, two-thirds of our reserves can already be classified as hard-to-recover, and by 2030 we will be talking about 80% or more that can be classified as hard-to-recover reserves, Sorokin said.