WSJ: Gazprom Sits Out Shale Race

As many of the world's biggest energy companies vie for shale-gas assets, a top executive at Russia's OAO Gazprom said it doesn't plan to join the frenzy.

"Our traditional reserves are tenfold more efficient than shale resources" to develop, Gazprom Deputy Chief Executive Alexander Medvedev said in an interview Thursday. "In Russia, we put [shale] on a long shelf and maybe in 50 to 70 years we will look at it again." He said the state-controlled company, the world's largest producer of natural gas, has "plenty" of its own shale resources.

Gazprom has said that shale drilling, which requires a process called hydraulic fracturing to break apart underground rock, poses "significant environmental risks, particularly the hazard of surface and underground water contamination with chemicals applied in the process." Gazprom also said services and pipelines in Europe are insufficient to enable the sort of drilling boom that has flooded the U.S. and Canada with inexpensive natural gas.  MORE (May require registration)