About 170 tons of oil leaked Thursday from a Siberian refinery belonging to state-owned oil giant Rosneft, according to emergency response officials cited by news agency Interfax.
“The total size of the spill was about 170 tons and the size of the affected area is 1,200 square meters,” according to a spokesperson for emergency services in the city of Nizhnevartovsk in the Khanty-Mansiisk autonomous district quoted by Interfax.
The spill took place in the early morning from one of the refinery's reservoirs as excess water was being drained off, according to a Rosneft spokesperson cited by Russia's RIA Novosti news agency.
Rosneft said that there was no risk to the surrounding territory and the spilled oil was being cleaned up, according to RIA Novosti.
Hundreds of tons of oil are spilled every year in Russia, according to environmentalists, and the problem is particularly acute at Soviet-era fields with aging infrastructure.
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