Gazprom Neft to produce high-tech graphite electrodes for Russia’s metallurgy industry

St.Petersburg, April 30 - Neftegaz.RU. Gazprom Neft has begun implementing an investment project to develop a cutting-edge graphite-electrode plant in the Avangard Special Economic Zone (SEZ) in Omsk.

Target capacity at the plant is 30,000 tonnes per year, which will cover domestic steel manufacturers’ increasing demand for heavy-duty graphite electrodes, significantly reducing the domestic metallurgy industry’s dependence on imports.


Anatoly Cherner, Deputy CEO for Logistics, Processing and Sales of Gazprom Neft said:

• We are starting out on implementing a project unique to Russian industry
• High-tech production of Russian electrodes will reduce foreign products’ domestic market share
• Thanks to the major modernisation programme being implemented throughout the Omsk Refinery, we are developing a new business area and facilitating the manufacturing of high-margin products, further improving value-chain efficiency and further diversifying the company’s business

Modernisation of this complex is currently ongoing, completion of which will allow the Omsk Refinery to become the 1^st needle-coke producer in Russia: all of this raw material being currently imported.
The future plant will be operated by Gazprom Neft subsidiary Gazpromneft-Bitumen Materials.