Kazakhstan: The company plans to start rolling stock production in Atyrau in 2024.
Recently, the head of the Atyrau region, Serik Shapkenov, announced that a car-manufacturing plant with a design capacity of up to 6,000 cars per year and initial investments of KTZ 76 bln ($170 mln) would be built in the region.
When contacted by ROLLINGSTOCK, Sergey Gorsky, a member of the board of directors of the TEXOL Group, said that the project was being implemented by his Group. TEXOL, Kazakhstan, is a service provider for the oil and gas sector, offering transport services and repair of freight cars at the Atyrau facilities of the West Kazakhstan Service Company.
According to the TEXOL, the project will start with launching the production of gondola cars and flatcars with an axle load of 23.5 tf, followed by the production of 13-6741 articulated flatcars with 25 tf bogies. The first vehicle was manufactured by the Russian United Wagon Company, UWC, for the PRO//Motion.Expo Fair, while the rights belong to the TEXOL Group, which ordered it.
From 2025, the plant will produce tank cars, including those for liquefied petroleum gas (LPG). UWC is now completing fulfilling its second contract with the Group for the manufacture of 15-9541-01 articulated LPG tank cars. These are the first articulated cars on the CIS market. Upon completion, there will be more than 750 such vehicles. The TEXOL fleet also includes other models of UWC articulated tank cars: the 15-629 for light oil products.
Today, three companies build freight cars in Kazakhstan. They are ZIKSTO, Cool Infinity, and Kazakhstan Car-Building Company. According to the ROLLINGSTOCK data, 2,200 freight cars were registered as produced in Kazakhstan in 2022, which is three times more than in 2021. According to the Organisation for Cooperation of Railways, by the end of 2022 the fleet of freight cars in Kazakhstan amounted to 134,100, of which 43% were gondola cars.
