RUSSIA - Oct. 29 - ExxonMobil To Invest Oil & Gas Projects.

ExxonMobil Corp. says it is ready to spend $4 bn over five years to develop large offshore oil and gas fields off Sakhalin Island in the Sea of Okhotsk north of Japan. ExxonMobil will be the operator and owns 30% of the JV developing the fields. Its partners are Sakhalin Oil Gas Development of Japan, with 30%, and Rosneft RAO of Russia and ONGC Videsh Ltd. of India, each holding 20%. The fields contain 2.3 bn barrels of oil. The first stage of development involves building roads, an airfield, pipelines and other facilities as well as drilling wells. Oil is to begin flowing in 2005. Some of the deposits of natural gas will be piped to Japan. (ExxonMobil began exploring the fields in 1996. The project could grow to $12 bn over its life of 30 to 40 years, and is the largest single foreign investment in the country so far. In recent months Moscow has been clearing the way for the project awaiting regulations and commitments to fixed rates of taxation that ExxonMobil said were vital. But the crucial development was the warming of relations between Moscow and Washington after the pledge last month by Pres. Putin to support the US war against terrorists in Afghanistan. Glenn Waller, director of external affairs for ExxonMobil in Russia, said: "This is the green light. We've been encouraged by progress on structural reforms. The bilateral relationship and improvements in that area have not been lost on this project. The broader context has given confidence").