POWER PLANTS AND OIL INDUSTRY IN THE USSR: ROMANIAN PETROLEUM SOVIET POWER PLANTS.

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP82-00039R000100080071-5
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 11
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: May 30, 2012
• Sequence Number: 71
• Content Type: REPORT

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k' 2i1' Pornr P'r t1. Tho peek loads of power plants o(1012' in the
and winter and preparations suit be ude with this in view. Remodeling and
oonstruction of power plants has been stepped up; in 1947, 3 billion rubles
were set wide for this work. However, the construction trusts and the sup-
pliers of equipment of the power plants did not fulfill their soheduies
on time.
During the first quarter of this year, the Ministry of Electric Power
Plants did not fulfill its plan and failed to put some new tm'bine and boilers
in operation. The Construction Trust of the Dnepr Eleotrio Power Plant
(Dn.prostro7) was even further behind. The builders at the Kurakhovka and
Fans Electric Power Plants are in arrears. The enlarging of the electric
power plants of Ivanovo and Gor 'kiy is progressing very slowly. The Min-
istry of Metallurgy is behind schedule in putting into operation the new
-
aggregates at its own plants in Chel7abinek and Tula and so is the Min
stry of Constradtion of KeavY Industy Enterprises with respect to the
i ~
TETa of Brresniki. Because the work has not been completed and some in-
dividual parts are missing, the maohinee which are almost ready must remain
idle ? The directors of the Turbine Plant of Karkhov and those of the
NUralelektroapparat" Plant are guilty for the delay for putting into opera-
tion the new power eources for the electric power plants of Krivoy Rog,
Dneprod$ershinek, and others. Turbine plants are slow in filling orders
for the power industry,
The Council of Ministers, annoyed at the failure to supply the else-
trio power plants with the necessary equipment, and the concomitant delay
in putting these plants into operation, has ordered the Ministry of Heavy
Machine Building, the Ministry of Electrical Industry, and others to take
energetic steps to hasten the delivery of this equipment
IDS the course of this stain ar, the power plants have not received even
half of the fuel that they will need to operatei.during the winter. Co.].
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is 8aein is not satist$ctQI7 and the sane conditian
hauling it the Done
prenils in the KaMtrk 8aein.
Maspr electric pour p]ants and power notvorks havo Milled and evon
exceeded their repair a s sigasais altho'uih thiN is nvt tho case ]tore,
The oral Power Plant, which is ltnotioning properlyi cannot rake up the
deficienoT in the prodMotion of eleotrio power of the power plants of the
8uin. eD'onbaeeenergoie e~~rgQ" of Moscow, and the power
Donets
plants of Kiev, ' , and other cities are behind in their z' pairs.
It is said that the responsible parties are the in etpliera, such as
Elektroaila Plant in Leningrad, Transformer Plant in M eoow, and Kirov
The Xirov Plant was to have iznufaotured 5,000 blades
Plant in thA gale.
and so far s tuxniehed only 500 to the power plants.
for t'tirbines
tion in respect o the norae f or the extraction of petroleum
The aitna
is neatislactor9' not only for the trusts of Acerb ydshan 'Aaneft' ."
ociations trusts, and oil fields have ceased to follow the
Almost all see
technical norms for the extraotion of pet~olsu and have substituted for
these th roduotioa of individual wells. The methods of extraoting petro-
leum have not been o ed in any manner and the plan has not mobilised
the cadres of workers, engineers, and mechanics either for the oomplete
development of the capacity of the wells or for an increased effioie*ey
in work. The ministry asks the managers in the petroleum industry to give
'~
their opinions of the norms for extraction but not about the meaewee which
should be adopted so as to eliminate the defioienoiee noted in the arti-
ale of Comrades aoliekov and Kurasohev.
The Teorganization of petroleum extraction, which took place about
with the institution of squads for the extraction of crude
10 years ago,
undoubtedly had a large part in the increased oil produ~otion.
oils
The essential feature of the formation of these squads waa to coor-
dinate their aotivit with the finial results of a given group of wells.
~'
In other words, the s9tads were primarily interested in the extraction of
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r mgt oon1taflt2'Y im71Ove their tech"
trolewa. OoTaeq%*mtly , th rquod
Pe
ni qp in extraotiZag oil, improve the Sldr of the well, amd eli~inate b
4
action *dibh was due to orgraaisational or
e1e17 ;?anr *W oearatioa of extr
teohmioal activity. Each rquaA ihoold bo rated on the baoir of itr tu]'
lillmer-t of the eatabliahrd~~~~ of extsaotion. Therelaa'e, te mom of
e,ctraotion it the boas crowd which must bs oared the rearoh for new
er for inoreaai 1 petro1eu~ extraatiofl.
porribiliti
In Februry amd Isarah 1947, the Bi3cut branoh of "5iT," a petroleum
extraotiou in the branohee of the A'??
aaroaiation, oheoked the normr of
7 of "8taliz~nett ~" Tit, 011 Field
nelt'" trurta1 that it Oil Field No
No of "Ord2honikid2Onot't, n Trait, and Oil Fio ld No 2 of "KaRdnoviah?
elt Trusty In Oil Field No 7 it was lowed that the gnarterlT norms
of roduotion were based on the data for the last 2 or 3 month, using
p
individual uellr. Thar gave a norm of
the theaxetioal production of same
ooerrive beoauae the squad had deep
86 tone for April This seemed e
was decided to lower the established
llr which often neared to flow. It
we
norm.
In Oil Field No 5 of nprdrhonikideeneltt" Trust, the norms were too low
relation to the oapaoit9 of the wells.
in
In Oil Field No 2 of Kag9novia1 neft ' " Trust, the norm were also too
n
to the potential capacity of the weds
low and did not correspond either
or to the aotual extraction.
the oil fields of "Asneft'" Treats, the er-
It is to be noted that in
based on the aottm-1 extraction of petro?
tablisbment of extraati4e warms was
leuna from the given well during the preceding months ; that is, the actual
extraction ~,~-' average the arithmetic mesa) . The
extraction was taken as the d
sms of the worms for the individual wells were not dram up in the oil
fields of the "Azneftt" Association.
Neither in the trusts (except "5talinneft ' ") , nor in the oil fields,
nor even in tion of "Azneft~" is there a taoe of Us
the Main Adminirtra
the corms of extraction by' squads which were
direotiver for establiahia6
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Yinirter of the Petrolmu~ tnduatry, on 3 August
isaaed b gorlov, Deputy
1942.
e, r le offio *1 direotiva for establishing the ru
This look of
of extraction oraatea, in the trusts of Nit~neft'," an unbelievable dis-
artablishini the norms for each iX*ividtul well t
parity in the methods of
Ths ndministratirw direotive$ of the assooiation give! however quite olear
indications o! the w~ in which the extractive norm is to ba oa1ou1ated,
when this aiist bs altered, sad how tha work progrsma are to be formed.
al and soiez~tifio etandards for aatabli$hing of
Actually, these technic
onelly forgotten. 8o, the deplorable condition in
norms have been intents
norms of extraotion is readily twderstandable.
the natter of ratting up
rectors of the trusts and the oil fields to oot~neot,
The desire of the di
at all coats , the general plan for extraotion of petroleum for the trust
each individual well bas brought , in practice, the
with t~ manes for
lim a puxel3- arithmetic mean. The sum of the norms of
~,ting of the norm to
individual wells ie oamdidered equal to the general ex-
extxsotion for the
tractive plan of the oil field. There are mark caws when the poaaibili-
extraction in the individual wells have been hidden.
ties to increase the
theee methods lead to en increase in the norms of
times, it is true,
extraction is respect to the former norm of the wells; but the tmfort'%mate
thing ie that this method of fixing the norms is effeoted without a detailed
of the extractive capacity of the individiw1 wells.
atdy
There is no doubt that a complete study of the fixing of the extraotive
is of the oapaoitiee of each well would overcome the
norms and an saall-a
enoes between the plan for extracting petroleum for the
imavorabla differ
whole oil field and the norms of extraction for the squads.
It is partioular13- important to eetablish for each well its oapecity
which mast be the basis of the norms of extraction to
and its poseibilitiea
be set . Such norms , which would put the same pressure on each squad, would
up
be able to stimulate the squads much none toward an inoreased extraotion and
'~
would constitute an objective criterion of the valuation of the good ao~
tivity of the individual squads of the oil field.
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one of the beet ways to improve the extrsotive norms is to perteot the
work of ezsmining the welle. This has bean postponed b numerous oil
Sieldsj they have not given suffioient thought to this highly' neoeeUry
work. The ignorsnoe of the potential oapaoitirs of the individual wells
is shoripartioulsrl7 in the quality of the fixed norms.
Equally u isortsnt a e the work of improving the regulrstions of the
extraotive novae is the elimination of numerous organisational defioienoies
which have s bad effect on the noraal activity of the squads. In some
oil fields of the NAsneft ~" trusts, the workers snd even the squad foremen
do not know the n4ms of extrsotion for the wells to whioh $hly are assigned
or their potentisi oapaoities. This ie because the oil field has delayed
in setting up the extraotion norms snd thus the squads work blindl~- for a
long time.
Not all of ielde reoord the activity of the squads and the emount of
petroleum dtraoted by them. In these oases, the extraction is divided
conventionally among the sgioads. As coefficients for the inaccurate valu-
ation by the oil field, there is given a constant and uniform 0.9 for the
squads assigned to the deep pumps] while for the other squads thr doef-
ficient varies between 0.8 and 0.96 according to the e~moumt of extracted
petroleum. In this way, even if one well or another is not i* operation
for several days, the production is still recorded.
Ofdoubtedly, the solving of the queetion of separate computation for
each squad is the most difficu thing, because there is a lack of dross
aM also poor liaison between oil fields. However, better attention df the
directors of the oil fields and trusts to this problem would solve it.
9 October 1949
An enonimoua inforni t reports that he met a likeable Ceeohoelovak
engineer, about 27 years old, in the camp of Cinecitta. This Czech had
been arrested at Brno on 10 August 1945 and sent to Ploesti, where the So-
viete give preliminary instructions to the specialists, and later he was
Bent to Baku.
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w, the Oseoh ineer, told tine informant that inspite of the
propaganda in the Soviet preen on the Brett production of petro1en~a,
by pereoM]. observation he oould form t 6oIa117 different opinion. The
organisation is weak and production is based in a laarge part oa the labor
of women and peieonere who work kneordeep in mud to the limit of their
physical strength.
The leaders of the petroleum industry are not specialists by officials
of the Comm mtet Party. From the very beginning, the work Rae based on
the Stakhanovite pystem, in which quantity superoedes quality.
In the Baku region, the petroleum reserves are already reaohiag their
limit. Nevertheleso, extraotio is being effected at top speed without a
thought of what Will be left 10 years from now. The depth of the dspoeite
in the Baku region varies between 600 and 1,200 meters. The average daily
depth of drilling is 50 to 60 meters byt sometimes this reaches 125 meters
in 12 hours , bat at other time a during the week it say be only 50 centi-
meters for 12 houre. It is neoessary to be very cautious in drilling wells
in the open sea because the depth of the water is about 250 meters in the
petroleum sons. The maximia dietanoe of the wells from the shore is about
2 kilometers.
The Czech engineer was later traneferredtbo the petroleum region of
Keroh, which is about the same size as the Bake field and is equally rich.
Petroleum hae been extracted in the Kerah region for about 20 years.
The engineer remained in this field for 4 weeks.
He was next sent to Estonia and employed at Kingiaepp, which is lo-
cated between the Nana River, the city of Narva, and the seashore resort
of Kingerburg. He worked 3 years for a branch of the Soviet petroleum
industry. During this p eriod, he was assigned to do prospecting with a
epeoial electrical apparatus. He worked the shore of the Betio Sea
from Roja (on the same latitude as Tuka~os) and Popperwalen to Leningrad
in the hopes of finding oil depoaite. He was partially successful and found
minor deposits near Rosa. From Roja to Leningrad there was no trace of oil
nor from Riga to Estonia. Some deposits were discovered south of Leningrad.
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Volosovo, at the south mad of this oil Held, is the oeut.r of production.
Similar prospecting wu done to the worth of th. former reoidenoss
of the Cur at Pmtergoff and orsnienbaa. Although no oil was disoov red,
methane gas dmpoaita were found.
The following general statements are valid for the whole petroleum
industry. The maJority of the speoLaliats are foreigners . Rnaaniana,
Poles, Germans, and, surprisingly English. The last haw been required to
become Soviet oitisens. Sixty peroent of the workers are not Soviet oitiseas
but prisoners of war and foreignersp foreigners form most of the office
fora.. The reuaiaiag 40 percent are women, youths, and old men (most of the
latter are from Estonia woad Latvia} . There are about 70 specialists who
are prisoners of war. Soviet citisens between the agee of 11 and 50 are
subject to military duty in the Red lags, which is preparing with all its
night for an aggressive Ear.
The Oseob engineer does not believe that the USSR is svfficient]a'
t,
armed at this tiae to sustain a war. war, however, in inevitable and
time favor, Moseow.
The Soviet goiternment is extreme]y anxious to cover its 'ack of epee
oia1iets as quic~],q as possible and to this end the Soviet youth is being
given a methodioal instruction. With these youths, the Soviet 'Anion will
form its own general staff of specialists on whom it can ootat to be 100
percent loyal. It is hoped that this will be ~oompliehed in 10 sears.
The various Soviet industries have organised professional schools in which
the instruction is free and the course last for 5 aeon' The eohoSl
hours are 0700 to 12100 and 1300 to 1900.
The engineer was next traneferred to Vienna where he succeeded in
escaping. He hoi*s to be able to emigrate.
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sTAT IT MADE 3! OZIOH10ILOVAR BLOT X
on 15 A t 1943, I reoeiwd an engineeri C diploma at Hoohenstadt
and iaosodiately rent to an eleotrio rotor plant od by' fat in
xaltenlaut'ch.
on 3.0 August 194, I was pulled in b,' the soviets and Bent to Ploe'
(Riui.ta) with 30 Cslchoslovak techfl'cian$. Petroleum exploitation ie
divided into fihree sections! section 1 dealt with research and aormdinga,
seotion 2 with the emotion of derrioke for sinld3g oil well', and
Section 3 with the extua1 exploitation. There are also subsection' for
transport, repair of machinory, and other related mattere.
At Ploesti, I was aeeigned to Section 2 tinder a Russian chief engineer,
about whom I sa waable to furnish information. He was in charge of the
goologiste and of the technical inepeotion of this section.
Section 1 was subdivided into two branches; one branch was interested
in pb sios research, the other in eleotroteohnioal methods. The two
branches of Section 1 presented their data and where this showed positive
results Section 2 erected the derricks and then gave wa7 to Section 3,
which performed the actual extraction.
There were about 10,000 people working at Ploesti; about 10 percecct
were teohnioiane of various rationalities, 60 percent were Rumanian work-
ers, and 30 percent were Soviet technicians and guards.
The oil field was intersected by a double?traok railroad which was
used to carry the oil in tankeare to the refineries located in this zone.
I cannot give the nt ber of tan'koars of refined products which were loaded
daily nor the nwnber of wells in the f ield, because I stayed only a week
.
at Ploesti. However, local eom'oee said that the production was '?0 percent
less than during the German occupation.
Access to the. production zone of the field was limited to hose who
had special passes issued by the NKVD. There were three iishaot classes
of passes: Class A for day workers (0600 to 1800), Class 8 for night
workers (1800 to 0600) , and Class 0 for technician and valid at all times.
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Bach U us assiped a number quad the average daily production
was about 40 tens, The daAof the weUs usua117 'Varied between 700 and
'~
1,200 meters, There is one case when a will was drilled to 1x,700 meters
but no oil was found et this depth and the ground proved friable.
The area of the oil-bearing Bone at Baku is about 30 square kilometers
field in the Caspian Sea where 80 wells ban been drily
not including the
at distances flrying up to 1r200 meters off shore. The water depth is 80
to 150 meters.
e best oil came from the southern part of the cone p in the other
Th
parts there was a high paraffin?oontent and a larger amount of water.
had about 20 refineries of old type and low output and also the
Baku
refineries 1K.8," "V.21," and "D (1) ." Tho not iaportant
following modern
wee "V . 21" which also had a loadipg station. There was "tao a plant for
residues and two eleotric power plants operated by gas turbines.
processing
these plants had a capacity of 50,000 kw and the other 120,000 kw.
One of
These plants furnished eleotrio power to the petroleum industry. The
well derricks are operated by electric motors (two of 140 kw each), or
by Diesel engines (four motors of 300 hp, in two groups of two) , or by
600 hp steam angines. The derricks were either wcrden, 30 meters high,
or steel, 40 meters high. When the well was fully drilled, a new 16-meter
derrick was installed for actual extraction
Lately, a 1r000-meter well could be drilled in a month of work.
JI],l of the workers at Baku were issued a similar pass, although the
technicians had a different type. Internal security was maintained by
3 , 000 soviet g s in black uniforms. External security was delegated to
units the Pd Ar'; the soldiers wore the collar insignia of the NKVD.
of
I noticed about 10 uniformed NKVD men, but the total strength was unknown
to me because the majority were in plainclothes.
The guard service attributed to sabotage even machinery failures
which were generally due to the worn-out condition of equipment from hard
For this r?ason, an average of five workers disappeared
and long service.
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every month through sentenoing and deportatioa. The workers lived in
aontant !ear and the teobnioiane avoided aq indication of initiative
,
in inor?asing production boom a >ater decline in production would be
fatal to them.
There is no safety equipo~t in the work area, and operations are
ineffioient betause Brost of the neietante are appointed to their positions
by virtue of their fanatical Communist eentiaent s.
1 was authorized to etudy mining engineering under old,
At Baku,
local engineers and geologists.
The workere at Baku, U at Ploesti, had to atter>d meotinge of a po1i?
and eooia1 aharaoter and, at times, documentary tilae of the eaae
tioal
The work ehifte were 12 hos with a 24?hour xeet period.
nature ,
On 10 Ootober 1946, I Nee assigned to Section 1, under Dr. Sommerauer,
and left on the same dy- with this section for Keroh. There were 600
a
this livid and research and soundings were to be done to increase
wells in
the yield . The section prospected about 20 square kilometers of terrain,
from the limite of the old field. The depth at which petroleum
starting
was found averaged 700 meters.
After a month at Keroh, I aocompanied the section to Kingieepp,
between Revel and Leningrad (actually 60 kilol~eters south of
which lies
Leningrad) , to do research in the triangle bounded b9 Orenienbaum, Volo-
cove, and Kin8isePp. Only tour wells were set up in this area, and in
these the petroleum showed ash water content. Rich deposits of methane
*B were fou and this has been piped to Leningrad for industrial use.
The "Meeswage" method, based on principles of physics, was usefor pros-
I know very little about the details of this method because I
peoting.
was working on the eleotroteohnical method, which registered explosive
200-meter depth to determine the ooourrenoe of petroleum. The
waves at
aeoftlgurn method was also used, based on the flow of an electric current
n
between two wells.
After 2 'ears in this areas _ I was transferred with the section to the
y
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eouthorn sector to drib in the Xingieepp ? Roja ? Revel triangle. On7
it Ro ja was petrolets fotad aid this was of poor quality.
On 10 Juno 1949 I wan sent, together with five other teohnioiau
of this eootion inolading 0r. 8oameraner, to the administrative headquarbm
for the Luntrian oil fields with an offioo in Vienna at J agassee V cIV
Xantgas aer~ mieeion was to do the PraAatoz work for the a~loita-
~'
tion of the ZistersdorP region. The head of the adainistration was the
Soviet engineer Xoniev who had about 200 people under him. Out of this
number, 80 were Soviet rational and the rest were local people.
On 20 July 1949, I deoided to escape beoauae I had reoeived orders
to return to Baku along with the other technicians who had come here
with m~1
From Vienna I went to Klagenfurt and from there to Innebruok, where
I surrendered to the Frenoh authorities. I was repeatedly questioned
and sent to a boal camp, presumably to await an investigation,
On 7 august 1949, I escaped from the detention oamp and reached
tit Brenner Pass and thence Italian territory.
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