Oil output in Russia, the world?s top crude producer, rose 2.2% to a post-Soviet record of 10.145 million barrels per day in 2010 on the back of growth in greenfield deposits? development.
The growth in crude production surprised many analysts, who had expected 1.1% on average, when polled just before the start of 2010.
Russian energy ministry data on Sunday showed the country extracted 10.145 million barrels per day last year, a record since the collapse of the Soviet Union, up from 9.93 million bpd in 2009 and 9.78 million bpd in 2008.
The Russian government said last month it expects oil output to edge down this year.
Here are some Russian oil industry milestones:
* According to the International Energy Agency, Russia?s oil production peaked at 11.41 million barrels per day in 1988, when it was still part of the Soviet Union. Russia accounted for 90 per cent of total Soviet oil output. In the early 1990s, marketing of Russian oil was concentrated in the hands of the former Soviet state marketing organisation Soyuznefteexport, renamed later Nafta Moskva.
* In the last days of the Soviet Union, Russia?s oil production fell to 10.4 mbpd in 1991, down 9.5% from 1990 and down 17.7% from the 1988 peak. Many analysts say the slump in oil production and prices were the main culprits behind the fall of the 70-year-old Communist empire.
* In 1996, the year when Boris Yeltsin was re-elected as Russia?s president, oil production declined to 303 million tonne, starting a three-year period of stagnation amid underinvestment and slowing demand.
* Russian oil output fell by about 1 percent in 2008 to 488 million tonne, or around 9.8 mbpd, the first decline in a decade as crude prices collapsed by the end of the year on the back of a worldwide economic downturn.
The decline in production, started in May 2008, was reversed in March 2009.
* Russian oil output grew by around 1.5 percent in 2009 to a new post-Soviet high of an average of 9.925 mbpd for the year and exceeded 10 mbpd level for the first time since the collapse of the Soviet Union in the month of September.
Russia overtook Saudi Arabia, where production is restricted by Opec-imposed quotas, as the world?s largest producer as new fields were launched, including Yuzhnoe Khylchuyu, Vankor, Uvat and Talakan.