A New Opening in Russia's Oil Fields

Vagit Alekperov founded Lukoil two decades ago and built it into Russia's largest nonstate oil company, with $105 billion in revenues. Yet in a recent interview, Alekperov was daunted by prospects in Russia, where Lukoil's production may decline this year. He's more enthusiastic about Iraq and West Africa. "It is not easy to produce oil anymore in Russia," he says.

After the fall of the Soviet Union, Russia rebuilt oil production from about 6.2 million barrels per day in 1999 to over 10 million barrels per day in 2011. Many industry players and analysts say it now risks hitting a wall. Russia has mostly relied on oil fields discovered or developed in Soviet times. Production at once-rich fields, mostly in West Siberia and the Urals, account for close to 90 percent of Russian output, according to Russian investment bank Troika Dialog.