ChTPZ Group and Gazprom signed a bilateral agreement on scientific and technological cooperation for the years 2012-2015. The agreement is aimed at mastering the new kinds of produce with enhanced technical and efficiency characteristics that will meet Gazprom’s needs, ChTPZ reports.

The agreement provides for cooperation along three main routes: electrically welded large-diameter pipes, well casing, and oil well tubing. Experts from the two companies’ scientific and technological divisions intend to work on improving the quality of tubes, increasing their lifespan, and devising the normative and technical documentation for the pipe products.

‘Given that we keep on developing the resources in the Far North and in the areas with quite aggressive environments, it is absolutely crucial that the pipes meet extremely strict requirements. This is why it is so important to cooperate with the O&G companies in the supplier-consumer format,’ says ChTPZ Director-General Yaroslav Zhdan.

What is more, the agreement also covered a signing of a program on scientific and technological cooperation involving Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works, ChTPZ and Gazprom; the measures listed in the program are meant to implement an integrated approach to ensuring the guaranteed high quality of produce at all stages of developing natural gas pipelines (from steel strip to pipe to pipeline).