TPi July 2015

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business & market news
12 Tube Products International July 2015
Fine Tubes gains approval as KNPC vendor
Fine Tubes, a manufacturer of precision
tubing for critical applications across
a range of global markets, has been
approved as a vendor by the Kuwait
National Petroleum Company (KNPC)
for the supply of ferrous and non-ferrous
tubing for its refineries.
The approval remains valid until March
2020.
Established in 1960, KNPC is the
national oil refining company of Kuwait
and became fully government-owned
in 1975.
As owner of the Mina Al-Ahmadi, Mina
Abdullah and Shuaiba refineries, KNPC
is responsible for oil refining, gas lique-
faction and the distribution of petroleum
products within the local market.
Kuwait, a member of OPEC, currently
pumps around three million barrels
per day (bpd), mainly from maturing
oilfields, but plans to invest billions
of dollars in exploration over the next
five years in order to increase its
output capacity to four million bpd by
2020.
The tubing applications that Fine Tubes
will be able to offer to KNPC and its
qualified suppliers include downhole,
hydraulic and chemical injection control
lines; control lines in subsea umbilicals;
flowline control line tubing for pipe-in-
pipe bundles; downhole gauge cables;
control and instrumentation tubing;
pressure housings; and hydraulic
tubing for control measuring devices
and pumps.
Nicholas Head, Fine Tubes business
development manager – oil and gas
and chemical process, commented,
“Securing this approval will not only
open up important new opportunities
with KNPC, it will also help to strengthen
our position across the Middle East
region, which is obviously a hugely
important market for our oil and gas
business.”
Fine Tubes Ltd – UK
Tubular products for the Power of Siberia
TMK, a producer of tubular products
for the oil and gas industry, has started
large diameter pipe (LDP) supplies for
the Power of Siberia gas transmission
system by Gazprom.
Gazprom named TMK as one of the
tubular product suppliers for the
project following a tender held in
March, where the company won a
major lot to supply around 12.6bn
roubles worth of LDP in 2015-2016.
Shipments by Volzhsky Pipe Plant
include 1,420mm K60-grade steel
pipes with wall thickness of 21.7mm,
external anti-corrosion coating and
internal flow coating, operating at
over 9.8MPa. Throughout 2015 and in
January-February 2016, the company
plans to deliver 152kt of pipe. The
Power of Siberia is a key pipeline
transport project to deliver natural gas
from East Siberian Irkutsk and Yakutia
gas production centres to Russia’s Far
East and China.
The trunkline will be around 4,000km
long, with 38 bcm of gas annual
design throughput. Construction
started in September 2014, with the
first section over 2,200km long to
link the Chayandinskoye field with
Blagoveshchensk by late 2018. More
than 1.7MT of pipe will be required for
construction in 2014-2018.
“Being engaged in the Power of
Siberia project is a major opportunity
and a great responsibility for TMK,”
said TMK CEO Alexander Shiryaev.
“The new trunkline will be routed
in adverse climate and geological
conditions across highly seismic and
active fault zones, requiring reliable
and highly effective pipe solutions,
ready to be provided by our company.
“TMK intends to bid for other
contracts by Gazprom to supply pipe
for the trunk pipeline. We also plan to
supply a complete range of seamless
casing and tubing pipe for the
Chayandinskoye and Kovyktinskoye
fields, which are to feed gas to the
Power of Siberia.”
TMK – Russia