Russia to integrate resource classification system with UN in 2016

MOSCOW, Jun 20 (PRIME) -- Russia plans to integrate its national system for classification of hydrocarbon resources into the U.N. Framework Classification for Fossil Energy and Mineral Reserves and Resources (UNFC) in 2016, the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry said in a statement Monday.

“Russia plans to become the first country of the world that has integrated its national classification system into the UNFC, and the decision may be made until the end of this year,” Minister Sergei Donskoi said as quoted by the ministry.

Russia switched to a new hydrocarbon reserve classification system from January 1, 2016.

In late 2015, Donskoi said that the new classification acknowledges reserves only after a license holder approves a design project, which will allow the company to decrease preparation terms and start production faster. The classification also allows companies to calculate commercially viable reserves for a commercially viable development term and to not include economically inefficient measures into the design project, he said then.

Previous Russian classification system was based on the USSR model and did not include economic factors of field development, unlike international standards SPE-PRMS and SEC.

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