Norway Oil Giant to Start Exiting From Joint Ventures in Russia
(Odin Jaeger/Bloomberg , Bloomberg)
Lars Erik Taraldsen, Bloomberg News
OSLO
Energies.com 03 0212022
Equinor ASA will start withdrawing from its joint ventures in Russia in response to the invasion of Ukraine.
Norway’s biggest energy company, which is 67% state owned, had $1.2 billion in non-current assets in Russia at the end of 2021 and expects the decision to impact the book value of its assets in the country and lead to impairments, Equinor said in a statement on Monday.
“In the current situation, we regard our position as untenable,” Chief Executive Officer Anders Opedal said. “We will now stop new investments into our Russian business, and we will start the process of exiting our joint ventures in a manner that is consistent with our values.”
The decision comes after a slew of measures to isolate the Russian economy. The Norwegian government announced late on Sunday that it plans to remove Russian assets from its $1.3 trillion sovereign wealth fund, while BP Plc moved to dump its shares in oil giant Rosneft PJSC.
Equinor has been in Russia for more than 30 years and entered into a cooperation agreement with Rosneft in 2012. The Norwegian oil company said in 2020 that it planned to more than double its oil production in Russia after buying a stake in a Rosneft project in East Siberia for about $550 million.
bloomberg.com 002 28 2022
