Azerbaijan, Baku, October 24/Trend, E. Ismayilov/
Azerbaijan will turn into one of the largest hydrocarbon exporters and transit countries by providing much of Europe's demand for gas, the country's draft state budget for 2014 submitted for parliament's consideration said.
According to the draft state budget, this can be a reality with implementation of the Nabucco West gas pipeline project, as well as the existing and future connections and intersections in the South-East Europe alongside with the Trans-Anatolian and Trans-Adriatic gas pipelines.
The mentioned pipeline infrastructure will allow transportation of gas from other fields and Azerbaijan's perspective structures, as well as from the country's other regions, the draft budget said.
The TANAP project envisages gas transportation from the Shah Deniz field to Europe via Turkey. The initial capacity 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 supply of the Azerbaijani gas will be possible thanks to the TAP project. A consortium of Azerbaijani Shah Deniz gas condensate field development announced its choice of the TAP project in late June, as a gas transportation route to the European markets. The gas which will be produced in the second phase of Shah Deniz field, will be the main source of TAP.
The Final Investment Decision on the "Shah Deniz-2" project is planned for late this year. The first gas will be delivered to Turkey in 2018 and to Europe in 2019 within this project.
TAP is designed to transport gas from the Caspian region via Greece and Albania and across the Adriatic Sea to southern Italy and then to Western Europe.
The initial capacity of the TAP pipeline will be 10 billion cubic meters per year with the possibility of expanding to 20 billion cubic meters per year.
Shah Deniz reserves are estimated at 1.2 trillion cubic meters of gas.