Russia and Caspian upstream: 2022 in review

The events of 2022 will cast a long shadow over the region’s upstream sector because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. For Russia, core European gas markets were lost and IOCs flocked to the exit door. But liquids production proved more resilient than expected. For the landlocked Caspian region, the risk of over-reliance on Russian transit deepened, with Kazakhstan bearing the brunt of midstream disruption. Nevertheless, there were also plenty of positive milestones: from globally significant discoveries to progress at major developments. We look back at the headline stories of 2022: • Impact of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine - which operators exited Russia and how much did they write off? • Liquids production - how far did Russian and Kazakh liquids output recover? • Gas exports - where did gas flow as markets recalibrated? • Oil exports - how did Kazakhstan respond to unprecedented pipeline disruption? • Investment - did low-carbon projects move forward amid regional uncertainty?