During the course of 2004, a number of archaeological surveys were conducted on Sakhalin Island, within the framework of the Sakhalin II Project, which is an integrated oil and gas development project located in the Far East of Russia. The operator of the project is Sakhalin Energy Investment Company, Ltd. (SEIC). In order to protect cultural resources in the area of the Project’s direct or indirect impact, specific measures were provided at the design and construction stages of the Project. As a result of preliminary archaeological research along the pipeline footprint from 1998 to 2002, 68 cultural heritage objects were discovered, the majority of which were archaeological sites from the Early Paleolithic period to the late Middle Ages. Corresponding measure to mitigate impact of Project operations on the cultural heritage objects have been undertaken, including: re-routing, i.e. the modification of the pipeline layout and access roads; archaeological excavations; identification of protective zones for cultural objects, their fencing and safe keeping; archaeological monitoring during the whole period of Project construction activities, etc.

In 2004 a SEIC Cultural Resource Contractor arranged several archaeological expeditions including an investigation of two alternatives of the pipeline layout where 16 archaeological sites were found. Salvage archaeological excavations of the Dzhimdan-5 and Nabil-1 ancient settlements were also carried out and five semi-underground pit dwellings were studied. Archaeological monitoring was carried out for the majority of known archaeological and historical objects. All known sites were included in the alignment sheets and their location and description uploaded into the unified database. Some archaeological sites, located in immediate proximity to the pipeline right-of-way, were fenced and included in the plan of obligatory monitoring during construction operations.