Baku, Azerbaijan, Apr. 14
By Maksim Tsurkov - Trend:
Kazakhstan suspended on Apr. 13 the transit of its oil via Azerbaijan's Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) oil pipeline, a source on the Azerbaijani oil and gas market told Trend.
Kazakhstan made this decision as it intends to transport all the possible volumes of crude via the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC), which connects the fields in western Kazakhstan to Russia's Black Sea coast, said the source.
"Kazakhstan won't transport its oil via the BTC in the foreseeable future or at least until late 2016 due to the expansion of CPC, which currently transports up to one million barrels of oil a day," added the source.
Commenting on the possibility of exporting oil from Kazakhstan's Kashagan field via the BTC, the source said it is possible from technical point of view, but Kazakhstan wants to transport those volumes via the CPC.
The Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan mainly transports Azerbaijan's light oil produced at the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli block of oil and gas fields.
Edited by EA
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