Ukraine Russia to set up gas refining JV

Ukraine and Russia will establish a joint venture to produce machines for associated gas refining into synthetic fuel in the Samara region on Volga, Sergei Ryzhuk, governor of the Zhytomyr region in northern Ukraine, said on Saturday. "We have devised the technology and brought it to Russia to set up a joint venture company and use the technology. It is a complete scientific product tested on wells," Ryzhuk said, adding that the technology allowed refining 1,000 cubic meters of associated gas into 500 kilograms of synthetic fuel. The joint venture may be established in Samara even this year. The first machine has already been tested and will be turned over for operation by this May, Ukrainian ambassador in Russia Vladimir Yelchenko told news conference in Moscow.