Russia, the world’s second-largest crude oil exporter after Saudi Arabia, fully replaced its oil and natural gas reserves in 2023 helped by ample discoveries of new fields, the state commission on subsoil reserves said on Wednesday.

Newly registered oil and gas condensate reserves reached 550 million metric tons last year, it said, while Russia’s oil production stood at 523 million tons (10.46 million barrels per day).

New reserves of natural gas totalled 705 billion cubic metres (bcm) last year, the commission said, compared to output of 642 bcm.

According to the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment, cited by the Vedomosti newspaper, as of early 2023, total oil reserves in Russia stood at around 19 billion tons, while gas condensate reserves were at 2 billion tons.

Russia’s reserves of natural gas, the world’s largest, stood at around 44 trillion cubic metres.
Source: Reuters (Reporting by Olesya Astakhova and Vladimir Soldatkin; editing by Jason Neely)