Baku, Azerbaijan, Oct.28
By Emil Ismayilov - Trend:
It is necessary to enhance cooperation with other countries, establish the connecting pipelines and expand operations on liquefied gas in order to ensure the reliability of gas supplies to Europe, head of the energy community secretariat Janez Kopacz said Oct.27 in Baku during the XIII Conference on investments and regulation of Energy Regulators Regional Association (ERRA).
"Ensuring the security of gas supply is a very important issue on the background of Europe's dependence on Russian gas," said Kopacz.
He said that it is also important to reduce the consumption of gas and develop alternative energy sources.
"There is no clear formula, though," said Kopacz.
The situation with Ukraine has demonstrated the importance of the issue of security of gas supplies, the deputy assistant US secretary of state (Energy Resources Bureau, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the United States) Robert Ichord said.
Russia remains one of the main suppliers of gas to Europe. In turn, the Southern Gas Corridor and other sources will contribute to the diversification of gas supplies to the EU countries, said Ichord, discussing the opportunities and prospects for the supply of liquefied natural gas to Europe.
Southern Gas Corridor is a project that will allow Europe to diversify its hydrocarbons supply sources and increase energy security, and Azerbaijan to acquire a new market in Europe.
On December 17, 2013, a final investment decision was made on the Stage 2 of the Shah Deniz offshore gas and condensate field's development. The gas produced at this field will first go to the European market (10 billion cubic meters). Around six billion cubic meters will be annually supplied to Turkey.
The gas to be produced as part of the Stage 2 of the field's development will be exported to Turkey and to the European markets by means of expanding the South Caucasus Pipeline and construction of the Trans-Anatolian Gas Pipeline (TANAP) and the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP).
Annual production of gas will increase from 9 billion cubic meters (the first phase) by an additional 16 billion cubic meters in the second phase within the framework of the Shah Deniz project.
The contract for development of the Shah Deniz offshore field, which has proven reserve of 1.2 trillion cubic meters of gas, was signed on June 4, 1996.
The shareholders are: BP, operator (28.8 percent), Statoil (15.5 percent), NICO (10 percent), Total (10 percent), Lukoil (10 percent), TPAO (9 percent) and SOCAR (16.7 percent). These percentages include the recent purchases of equity from Statoil by BP and SOCAR.