Azerbaijan, Baku, June 5 / Trend E. Ismayilov /
The first gas will be transported through the Trans-Anatolian gas pipeline in 2019, SOCAR head Rovnag Abdullayev said at the 'Caspian Oil and Gas conference 2013' today.
He added that the operations have been held over the gas pipeline project for the last two years. After the project implementation, it will be possible to transport 16 billion cubic meters of gas from Shah Deniz gas condensate field. In the future, its capacity will be increased. This will allow transporting gas from other fields and perspective structures. The construction of the pipeline is planned to be launched next year.
"At present, the work is underway to choose a route of transporting Azerbaijani gas to Europe. The final decision will be made at the end of this month.
Azerbaijan is making its contribution in ensuring the energy security of the region, in particular, energy security of Turkey and Georgia. The operations are underway to increase the country's role in Europe's energy security.
Abdullayev said that Azerbaijan has an opportunity to extract 20 billion cubic meters of gas per year by 2015, excluding the gas injected into the reservoir to maintain pressure.
TAP and Nabucco West, are currently competing over transportation of Azerbaijani gas to the European markets. The gas which will be produced within the second stage of development of Azerbaijani Shah Deniz gas condensate field is considered the main source for these pipeline projects.
Nabucco West would require the construction of 1,300 kilometers of the pipeline (Bulgaria - 412 km, Romania - 469 km, Hungary - 384 km, Austria - 47 km) from the Turkish-Bulgarian border to Baumgarten in Austria.
The TANAP project envisages gas transportation from the Shah Deniz field to Europe via Turkey. The initial capacity of the pipeline is expected to reach 16 billion cubic meters per year. Around six billion cubic meters will be delivered to Turkey and the rest to Europe.
The TAP project is designed to transport gas from the Caspian region via Greece and Albania and across the Adriatic Sea to the south of Italy, and further to Western Europe. TAP's initial pipeline capacity will be 10 billion cubic meters per year, but it is easily expandable to 20 billion cubic meters per year. TAP's shareholders are Switzerland's AXPO (42.5 percent), Norway's Statoil (42.5 percent) and Germany's E.ON Ruhrgas (15 percent).
