OREANDA-NEWS. August 15, 2012. Hugo Jose Garcia Hernandez, Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela in the Russian Federation, and Hoglis Martinez, Minister-Counsellor for Energy, visited TATNEFT Company as part of their working tour of the major industrial enterprises of Tatarstan, reported the press-centre of TATNEFT.

The visit began with a tour of TANECO Refining and Petrochemical Plants Complex production facilities. The distinguished guests got acquainted with the construction progress of a combined hydrocracking unit. At present, large scale works of technological equipment installation are being carried out there. In July and August of this year alone five heavy equipment units were installed at the site: two high pressure separators, an absorber, a circulating gas compressor separator and a fractionator.

Further, the delegation proceeded to the territory of the refinery, where Nail Maganov, First Deputy General Director of TATNEFT and Chairman of the Board of Directors of TANECO, and Chingiz Khalilov, Deputy General Director of OTANEKO - Refinery Director, showed the key facilities of the first stage of the Oil Refining and Petrochemical Complex to the guests: CDU/VDU-7, the central control room, flare facilities and wastewater treatment facilities. The representatives of Venezuela thoroughly familiarized with the information about the technologies applied in the project implementation, the history of the Company establishment and asked a number of questions, in particular, on the general work organization, supply of raw materials, cost of construction, labor safety and personnel training.

Hugo Jose Garcia Hernandez pointed out that the TANEKO complex made a very strong impression on him. He particularly stressed the high culture of production in the environment of the ongoing construction works.

The trip agenda also included a visit to Nizhnekamsk Solid Steel Tires Factory. Anvar Vakhitov, Director of the tire manufacturing factory, briefed the guests on the unique production of SSC tires. The guests were shown the operation of rubber compounding and processing lines, tread ply and coating application, the assembly complex equipment, shaper-vulcanizers and the final operations section.

Having familiarized with the complete production cycle of SSC tires, Venezuela's Ambassador to the Russian Federation highly praised the productive capacity of the factory and the production automation level ensuring a reliable safety system, as well as a set of measures providing for the factory quality control of tires.

The representatives of Venezuela also visited the oil production facilities, where Nail Ibragimov, First Deputy General Director for Production - Chief Engineer familiarized the guests with up-to-date technologies and equipment, including energy-efficient methods of dual production and dual injection at the injection and production wells and long-stroke balancer-free chain drives (CD) in sucker rod pumping units, significantly reducing crude oil production costs, etc. Among the most effective technologies of air protection the guests were familiarized with the technology of hydrocarbon light fractions vapor recovery from tanks.

During the meeting of the delegation with the top managers of the Company headed by Shafagat Takhautdinov, Director General of TATNEFT, the high-ranking guests were offered a presentation on the activities of TATNEFT. In his presentation, Ravil Ibatullin, Director of TatNIPIneft R&D Institute, said about the results of the Company's Activity, informed about new technologies developed and applied at TATNEFT and also spoke about the experience of extra-viscous oil field development in the Republic of Tatarstan, which the Venezuelan delegation was interested in.

During the conversation with Shafagat Takhautdinov, Director General of TATNEFT, the representatives of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela expressed the interest in the Company's unique technologies to improve the efficiency of crude oil production in the fields at the late stage of development, as well as the exchange of expertise and practical training of Venezuelan students studying in Russia at the enterprises of TATNEFT.

The Venezuelan side expressed satisfaction with everything demonstrated pointing out that the rich experience, innovation potential and high professionalism of TATNEFT Company specialists open up broad prospects for mutually beneficial cooperation.