The operator of the sludge dump near Nizhnevartovsk is bringing the collapse of Integra-Burenia closer. Illegal waste streams remain silent in courts
“Lyubashevsky is losing interest in the oilfield service business”
The volume of financial claims of LLC Nanex (Nizhnevartovsk) to once one of the leading oilfield services in Western Siberia – LLC Integra-Burenie (registered in Tyumen, beneficiary – Felix Lyubashevsky) – approached 400 million rubles. Over the past year, the contractor has already sent about a dozen and a half claims to arbitration, a number of which have already been decided.
The Arbitration Court of the Tyumen Region recovered from Integra in favor of the contractor about 13.5 million rubles of debt under previously signed agreements. The Tyumen residents, however, still have the opportunity to challenge the decision on appeal, but practice shows that a change in the position of the court is unlikely.
Earlier, in April of this year, the arbitration court collected more than 21 million rubles from the oilfield services company in favor of Nanex, after which the Tyumen residents filed an appeal with the Eighth Arbitration Court. This process was about the work performed in September 2022 on the collection, transportation and disposal of drilling waste from production sites located within the borders of the Samotlor oil field.
It is noteworthy that, without disputing the existence of the most multimillion-dollar debt, the lawyers of Integra-Drilling insisted on violating the claim procedure, but to no avail. Moreover, during the meetings, data on other debts of the customer for previous periods were announced. Ultimately, the complaint was denied.
In total, in the confrontation between Nanex and Integra-Burenia, the oil service has already lost 5 cases, and, apparently, events will develop similarly in other proceedings, given their similar nature. At the same time, courts periodically accept applications for bankruptcy of the Tyumen company.
“Trial balloon” was launched by “Nanex” [1] back in May, but the lawsuit was dismissed, and the case was soon dismissed. The second attempt to declare Integra-Burenia bankrupt was made by the Nizhnevartovsk office in July, and MIFNS No. 14 for the Tyumen region was indicated in the documents as a third party. This time, the application was accepted for production, having scheduled a preliminary meeting for the end of August. But this time, too, the case was dismissed, in all likelihood due to reaching agreements.
But it is possible that other bankruptcy claims will follow Integra-Bureniy in the near future. So, already this month, its intention to go to court with demands to recognize the oilfield service as financially insolvent on the Fedresurs portal was officially indicated by its other partner, LLC Ukhtaneftegazstroysnab, registered in Dagestan, which provided some transportation services.
It should be noted that the requirements of contractors are a serious burden on Integra-Drilling. The company’s financial results in recent years look unsatisfactory. At the end of 2022, the company received a net loss of 504.9 million rubles, and in 2021 the profit amounted to a ridiculous 2.7 million. The company lost more than 327 million in 2019, and the profit of a relatively successful 2020 (255.2 million) cannot cover these losses.
We also note that Integra-Bureniye is currently managed by Integra Management LLC, whose president is Felix Lyubashevsky, and the founders are IG Holdings Limited from the capital of Cyprus, Nicosia, but the share is pledged to SBK Aktiv LLC.
The market is aware of the current situation in the once one of the leaders of the independent Russian oilfield services. In an interview with the publication, industry representatives name the main, from their point of view, reason for the current situation.
“The fact is that Felix Lyubashevsky has practically retired from business in the industry. He lost interest in oilfield services. He has a business abroad, as far as I know, in particular in the USA. Operational management in the Integra group is now carried out by Dmitry Shulman, who once headed the security service at Rosneft. But he is not a businessman, and it is difficult for him to deal with purely industry issues. In my opinion, Integra-Burenia does not have any serious prospects, and its positions have been lost. I would not even rule out that sooner or later it will finally leave the market,” says a representative of the capital’s trade union community.
The agency’s interlocutor also points to current trends in the market, in which independent oilfield services that previously stood firmly on their feet either go bankrupt or enter the systems of the largest mining companies, although the opposite trend was observed at one time. “Lyubashevsky, by the way, is a very talented entrepreneur, he did not want to fit into this picture and preferred to concentrate on other activities,” the industry specialist notes.
Drilling waste disposal
Photo: orenburg.vnt-saratov.ru
In turn, in the “green” community, they also pay attention to the opponents of the oilfield service company. Previously, Naneks was called one of the operators of the illegal toxic sludge dump at Samotlor on the 62nd kilometer of the Nizhnevartovsk-Raduzhny highway. [2]about which the publication informed in detail.
For the first time, interest in this object was indicated 10 years ago at a meeting at the presidential embassy in the Ural Federal District, but then the site went into the shadows for a long time. Meanwhile, according to local ecologists, there may be up to 500 thousand cubic meters of waste here, and the damage can reach 5 billion, which is comparable, for example, with the 202nd pad of the Priobskoye field [3].
“Over the years, there was just no one there: Rosprirodnadzor, Yugra Prirodnadzor, and even the FSB at one time. Violations were recorded en masse. At the beginning of this year, the Ural RPN Department demanded that the NVOS objects be registered, but I don’t know if this has been done. I suspect, based on the courts, audits and contracts, that the sludge from Integra and Samotlorneftepromkhim continues to be transported there. Integra itself is not interested in where the contractor is transporting the waste, and no one asks Nanex about the places of disposal, ”the environmentalists state.