Russia needs to prospect for oil and gas on the continental shelf despite oil price fluctuations, Russian Deputy Minister of Energy Kirill Molodtsov told RIA Novosti at the 13^th RAO/CIS Offshore 2017 International Conference and Exhibition for Oil and Gas Resources Development of the Russian Arctic and Continental Shelf.

"The Prirazlomnaya platform was developed in 1993, when a barrel of oil cost $9. Should we stop our projects? Sixty years ago, when we were thinking about Western Siberia, everyone said this was not right and that we should stop. Does this mean that we should now stop our shelf projects? Even the Prirazlomnoye field operates and produces the Arctic Oil (ARCO) brand. It produces high-quality light oil that trades well against our current Urals brand in Rotterdam," Molodtsov noted, while replying to a question about optimal oil prices for recouping shelf projects.

"If they tell us tomorrow that the shelf is our main asset, then we would be ready to accomplish this task. We are ready to operate on Sakhalin, in the Okhotsk Sea, and we can prepare to work in the Arctic zone, which we are  studying actively… We are gaining experience. Ladies and gentlemen, we need this today," Molodtsov explained.

Companies operating on the Russian continental shelf can afford to do this while implementing Arctic projects and posting sufficiently high production costs, he noted. "The state can subsidize them if they implement expensive onsite projects, since production costs now total $70-80 per barrel," he commented.