Pictures from TatOilExpo 2022: 3 universities, foreign guests and outlandish equipment

“Don’t try. Do it!”

The TatOilExpo 2022 exhibition on an area of 10,000 square metres became one of the pivotal events of the Tatarstan gas and petrochemical forum. Opening the forum, Rustam Minnikhanov, Tatarstan president, mentioned that 160 companies from 25 Russian regions gathered there. Exhibitors from four countries of the world provided the exhibition with the international status.

The light and spacious multifunctional pavilion of Kazan Expo is constantly full of people. A black glittering wall with a video installation appearing on it from time to time draws the attention at the entrance: for instance, a crawling huge leopard or the Tatarstan flag. This is how Tatneft presents itself. TAIF-NK JSC — Russia’s leading oil refinery in the production of light oil products from crude oil and gas — traditionally opened its stand in front of Tatneft. A big stand of SIBUR, both Gazprom and many other flagship manufacturers and suppliers of gas and oil equipment, oil corporations and holdings, oil and gas companies and refineries aren’t far.

Most companies present new developments: instruments, digital solutions, innovative products, technological projects. Of course, many of them expect to sign new contracts at the exhibition. Related universities show both groundwork in student training and interesting research created for oil and petrochemical companies. Here it is like the Hermitage: if you stay next to every stand for a long time, it will take weeks.

Therefore Rustam Minnikhanov, Tatarstan president, didn’t do it. But attending the exhibition he paid special attention to several stands. For instance, next to a stand of Kazan National Research and Technological University he carefully listened to a story about an innovative digital development allowing teaching specialists more effectively than before and the university’s latest scientific developments. He as usual spent much time next to big machinery: he curiously looked inside a swamp bugger running on liquefied gas.

Passing by small stands he was suddenly interested by what Tatlift offered: he heard out the description of new lifts, asked several questions and exclaimed after hearing the answer “We try”:

“Don’t try. Do it!”

From lab to production site

Universities, moreover, not only from Tatarstan, were present at the exhibition. They demonstrate the latest developments created for backbone enterprises. Many of these developments are designed to not only deal with import substitution but also use absolutely new approaches to technologies. So for instance Tomsk Polytechnic University, one of the basic Gazprom universities, brought a sample of an inspection complex for main gas pipelines. It was developed specialists of the Engineering School of Non-Destructive Control and Safety on request of one of Gazprom subdivisions.

Artyom Inzhukov, an engineer of the school, told Realnoe Vremya:

“This crawler was created to diagnose welding seams when building main gas and oil pipelines. This equipment has foreign analogues, but we focused on digital receivers, which is a step forward compared to them. We decided to show it at this exhibition because hydrocarbons are transported across the country, pipelines need to be constantly examined and repaired.”

Kazan National Research and Technological University presented its developments: for instance, the university’s engineering school develops various areas together with technological partners. The basic department and two labs were created with Gazprom, two master’s degree programme opened at the university with SIBUR. The university labs work on different developments: from chemical fibre to new fertilisers.

Kazan Federal University is traditionally active at the exhibition: its chemists, geologists, ecologists and programmers show their developments in the gas and petrochemical sector. Vladislav Sudakov, vice director of the Institute of Geology in Innovative Technologies, explained to our newspaper:

“Here we demonstrate our latest developments created this year. For instance, chemical surfactant polymers and biological systems to boost oil production. Also, it is digital solutions aimed to look for oil fields and automate routine processes. In addition, there are unmanned geological exploration and satellite technologies, which are interesting for representatives of geological exploration. Our ecologists do an interesting work: they select microorganisms from oil layers and strengthen their impact on the environment. For instance, oil viscosity underground can be lowered. What is presented here is already used in real projects. For instance, they are used both at Tatneft and small oil companies of Tatarstan. For instance, research is already done and wells were filled at the Romashkino Field with the help of these technologies.”

Foreign countries

Belarus turned out to be first the limelight of our correspondent among the four countries whose representatives came to the Tatarstan exhibition.

Yevgeny Averkin, vice director general of Mogilyovchimvolokno, explained:

“Our enterprise has been working with Tatarstan since its foundation day. The case is that we purchase the main feedstock for our production — monoethylene glycol — in Nizhnekamsk, at Nizhnekamskneftekhim. 30% of our polyether fibre for different areas of the industry is made of precisely the Tatarstan feedstock. In turn, we supply our products to local enterprises. So in Tatarstan we have not only suppliers but also end consumers. As part of Belneftekhim we annually attend this exhibition. Now it is especially important for all of us: a large-scale import substitution programme was launched, the construction of an allied state is ahead, therefore we are working actively. We brought samples of our fibre to the exhibition so that our colleagues will see our products. We hope the signing of new contracts will be the result of both the exhibition and the forum.”

Several Chinese companies represented mainly industrial equipment for oil production and processing. So Zhian Cui, director general of Xuan Jia Technologies, explained to our correspondent that their company makes valves and pipelines for oil and gas products. They came here because Tatarstan itself is rich in oil, also the biggest representatives of the sector from all over Russia gathered at the exhibition. Since they deal with equipment for this sector, they would like to discuss cooperation.

It is illustrative that before talking with the representative of the Chinese company, one has to wait for quite a long time: he and his translator are constantly busy answering visitors’ questions. Perhaps, because the whole stand is in Chinese and a person who knows nothing about hieroglyphs has no chance of understanding what a company makes.

Chirchiq Mash factory are neighbours from Uzbekistan. Regina Abdulmenova, leading manager of the factory, explains:

“We arrived here to expand our clientele, we want to work not only inside the country but also export products. We deal with oil, gas and chemical mechanical engineering. We already have clients from Russia, for instance, it is Ammonia, Schekinazot, Promo and of course Nizhnekamskneftekhim. We hope to offer alternative ways for import substitution in a number of gas and petrochemical projects.”

The exhibition at Kazan Expo went on. Innovative technologies, import substitution in different ways, digitalisation projects and of course constant networking — these are key things to single out here. Representatives of exhibitors working at the stands constantly explain to visitors of the exhibition the peculiarity of their developments — and the interest doesn’t go down. And the fact that the TatOilExpo has occupied twice as big area than in 2021 speaks about one thing: its importance goes up.