Azerbaijan, Baku, March 30 /Trend E.Ismayilov /
By 2015, the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) plans to increase volume of oil production at its own fields by two million tons, SOCAR head Rovnag Abdullayev told reporters on Saturday.
"At present, SOCAR is preparing a program, which does not aim at stabilizing oil production volume at old fields, but increasing the production", Abdullayev said.
He said this program covers both onshore and offshore fields, owned by SOCAR.
As Abdullayev said, new equipments and technology are required in order to achieve these goals, and therefore, the company is currently conducting preliminary work.
About 41.5 million tons of oil is predicted to be produced in Azerbaijan in 2013. In Jan.-Feb. 2013, Azerbaijan produced 7.2 million tons of oil and gas condensate, or 3.6 percent less than in the same period of 2012, the State Statistics Committee said.
In 2012, Azerbaijan produced 42.98 million tons of oil and gas condensate, or 5.3 percent less than in 2011.
The main volume of oil production last year accounted for Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli block of oil and gas fields and Shah Deniz gas condensate field, which are developed in cooperation with foreign partners.
The contract on large offshore Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli field development was signed in 1994.
Participants of the project to develop Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli are: BP (operator, 35.78%), Chevron (11.27%), Inpex (10.96%), AzACG (11.65%), Statoil (8.56%), Exxon (8%), TPAO (6.75%), Itocu (4.3%) and Indian ONGC (earlier its share belonged to Hess company).