Environmental impacts
Please direct questions relating to the Company’s Environmental Policy to Gazprom’s Press Service.
+7 812 729-47-60
Gazprom operates both in densely-populated Russian regions and in pristine areas across Eastern Siberia, the Far East, the Extreme North, and the Arctic shelf. No matter the region, the Company seeks to minimize its environmental impacts. To that end, Gazprom implements numerous environmental measures.
Figures and facts
Over the course of 2023, the Gazprom Group brought into operation the following facilities:
- 49 wastewater treatment facilities and structures with the daily capacity of 27,700 cubic meters;
- 6 waste treatment and disposal facilities with the annual capacity of 186,950 tons;
- 2 water recycling systems with the daily capacity of 52,820 cubic meters;
- 1 unit for capture and treatment of hazardous substances in waste gases, with the capacity of 30 cubic meters per hour.
meters
Framework
Air
Air protection is the most significant and multifaceted environmental activity of the Gazprom Group.
The Group’s corporate policy for climate protection takes into account Russia’s Energy Strategy until 2035 and the Environmental Doctrine of the Russian Federation.
Since 1992, Gazprom has worked to reduce emissions of the main greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide and methane), making efforts to develop its corporate system of greenhouse gas and pollutant monitoring, accounting and inventorying, as well as to retrofit and modernize its facilities. In addition, the Group is stepping up the utilization of associated petroleum gas (APG).
The Company is actively increasing gas grid coverage in Russian regions by promoting a wider use of natural gas, the most eco-friendly fuel of our time.
The use of natural gas as a vehicle fuel is spreading. From an environmental perspective, gas is on average five times more efficient than gasoline and diesel fuel. The expansion of the NGV market is a top priority for the Gazprom Group in Russia. Gazprom implements numerous measures to convert vehicles to natural gas in Russian regions, gradually expanding its gas filling network and the share of NGVs in its vehicle fleet.
Land
Land protection is one of Gazprom’s environmental priorities, as land is exposed to the largest impacts during hydrocarbon production, transportation and processing.
Natural landscape
Gazprom strives to minimize the area affected by its operations through a set of measures: modular construction of production facilities, well clustering, laying of multi-string pipeline systems within a single routing, and introduction of horizontal and directional drilling. Adoption of advanced drilling techniques, which are spreading across the Gazprom Group with every passing year, helps cut industrial waste and reduce waste disposal areas, as well as prevent soil disturbance and pollution during operations.
Permafrost
Gazprom preserves the integrity of permafrost areas by limiting site development, construction and assemblage operations to winter periods without disturbing the upper soil, which defrosts in summer. Other methods are used as well. For example, natural gas pumped via the Bovanenkovo – Ukhta gas pipeline is cooled down to minus 2–10 degrees Celsius. The pipes, all of them produced domestically, are thermally insulated.
Cleanup and reclamation
The Gazprom Group adopts innovative soil treatment methods and biotechnologies to remove hydrocarbon pollutants from soils and to restore disturbed land. The technologies take climatic conditions into account and contribute to cutting costs and accelerating soil reclamation processes.
In Yamal, for instance, Gazprom and Gazprom Neft introduced efficient soil treatment methods based on innovative biodegradation products that contain microorganisms (hydrocarbon-degrading bacteria that can be used for biological treatment of land at low temperatures).
A plant-based treatment procedure for oil-polluted soils (phytoremediation) is also widely used at the Gazprom Group. Grasses with branched root systems offer an optimal environment for hydrocarbons to decay due to better gas exchange in soil and a larger amount of biologically active substances produced by plant roots. Depending on the natural and climatic conditions, various balanced grass mixtures are used, providing reliable biological indicators of soil reclamation.
Comprehensive water treatment facility at Makhachkalinskoye Gas Pipeline Operation Center
The Group often applies reclamation measures to the land damaged decades earlier. To that end, Gazprom Geologorazvedka initiated a reclamation campaign at the Tambey trading station in the Yamal Peninsula. Many hectares of the coastal line were cleared of production waste left in Ob Bay since the Soviet times. Scrap metal and debris were collected for further utilization.
Water
The key to reducing the impact of production facilities on water resources is lowering water withdrawal and improving water treatment procedures.
Industrial environmental monitoring of all components of marine ecosystem. Analysis of seawater and bottom sediments at Dzhubga – Lazarevskoye – Sochi gas pipeline
Many of Gazprom’s subsidiaries and organizations play an important social role by supplying water to and accepting sewage from population centers for processing at their water treatment facilities.
Biodiversity
Gazprom developed and adopted a Biodiversity Preservation Program
Inhabitant of Gydan State Natural Reserve (Shokalsky Island), Yamal-Nenets Autonomous Area
Over the past years, the Gazprom Group released several million fingerlings into the sea. Furthermore, fish protection devices are used during the construction and operation of offshore facilities, such as the Prirazlomnaya platform.
Other areas
Industrial and residential waste disposal is associated with high environmental risks. This is why the Gazprom Group strives to adopt state-of-the-art practices and technologies to minimize waste. The Group constantly works to lessen the amount of its accumulated waste.
Gas pumped from pipeline section undergoing repair into operating section
Gazprom pays great attention to eco-friendly handling of oil sludge. Oil sludge is oil-containing waste consisting of oil products, water, sand, or clay. It is produced as a result of refining and pipeline cleaning.