Oil producer Potential Oil, owned by foreign entities, has paid the state 1.43 billion tenge in administrative fines for violations of environmental legislation. Attempts to challenge the penalties in court failed — courts of first and appellate instances dismissed the appeals, according to infohub.kz.
The Atyrau Region Ecology Department reported that it conducted an inspection of the company's compliance with environmental requirements, as well as preventive control with a site visit. The inspections revealed violations of industrial environmental control, requirements for wastewater monitoring, and environmental reporting.
Inspectors also found emissions of pollutants and the performance of certain works without the necessary environmental permits, exceedances of permissible emission limits, and violations in waste management.
The facility also had contaminated soil and bottom sludge that had accumulated without the required permits and approved limits. Moreover, the waste management program did not correspond to the actual volume of waste generated.
In total, the department drew up 37 protocols on administrative offenses and issued seven rulings imposing fines totaling 1,433,815,923 tenge.
Potential Oil appealed the measures in court. However, courts of first and appellate instances dismissed the company's appeals. As a result, the entire amount of fines — more than 1.4 billion tenge — was recovered to the state revenue.
According to Adata, the participants of Potential Oil are Datum Base Project Development-FZCO and First International Oil Corporation Limited S.À R.L. (FIOC). Datum Base Project Development-FZCO is registered in the United Arab Emirates, and FIOC in Luxembourg.
Potential Oil's main activity is the extraction of crude oil and associated gas. The company's profit for 2025 amounted to 2.6 billion tenge, down from 2.9 billion a year earlier.
According to the company's financial statements as of December 31, 2025, 80% of its shares were owned by Selford International FZCO, also registered in the UAE, and another 20% by FIOC. The ultimate controlling parties are citizens of Azerbaijan and Russia — Kanan Khudaverdiyev and Eduard Khudaynatov.
Potential Oil operates under contract No. 651 dated April 4, 2001, for exploration, production, and production sharing of hydrocarbons at the Begaydar block in the Isatay district of Atyrau Region, as well as general license No. 0003738 dated May 24, 2006, for the operation of mining facilities.
The company operates oil storage facilities and trunk oil pipelines under licenses No. 000100-06 and No. 000113-06, valid until June 15, 2033.
In addition, the company extracts common minerals, namely clay rocks at the Zhanatalap-2 block in the same Atyrau Region, under contract No. 187/2008 dated August 19, 2008.
Earlier, Kursiv wrote that Kazakhstan suspended the collection of a 2.3 trillion tenge fine from the Kashagan operator.