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TAP talks further plans for removing olive trees

Oil&Gas Materials 14 November 2017 09:36 (UTC +04:00)

Baku, Azerbaijan, Nov.14

By Leman Zeynalova – Trend:

The consortium for construction of the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) has continued pruning of the olive trees starting on October 23 in Italy and will restart working in the middle temporal (MT) area in the next days, TAP Head of Communications Lisa Givert told Trend.

“TAP has now moved the first set of olive trees (210) in the micro-tunnel area. These trees were transported to a nursery where they are carefully stored and are being meticulously cared for until they can be replanted at the original site (once works have finished),” she said, adding that work is continuing as per the schedule.

Givert said that in a second stage, TAP will need to move and store a further 1878 olive trees that are along the pipeline’s 8km route - from the micro-tunnel exit to the Pipeline Receiving Terminal (PRT) - before replanting them at their original site, when works are finished.

TAP will remove the additional olive trees as soon as the Verifications of Compliance (VoC or secondary permitting activities) are released by the competent authorities, she added.

“TAP is in peak construction phase which will continue well into 2018. For November and to the year end, TAP will continue to progress construction in line with our project construction schedule,” said Givert.

She noted that every day, hundreds of meters along TAP’s Right of Way (RoW) in Greece and Albania are cleared with pipe strung, welded, lowered into the trenches and backfilled.

“The construction of TAP’s compressor stations – one near Kipoi, in the east of Greece and one near Fier, in the west of Albania – began in the first and second quarter of 2017 respectively. Construction of the compressor stations is expected to take two years and is also proceeding according to schedule. In addition to the two compressor stations, there is also a gas metering station being constructed near Bilisht, in the east of Albania. Works at the metering station commenced in the second quarter of 2017 and work is progressing well,” added Givert.

TAP is a part of the Southern Gas Corridor, which is one of the priority energy projects for the European Union. The project envisages transportation of gas from Azerbaijan's Shah Deniz Stage 2 to the EU countries.

The pipeline will connect to the Trans Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP) on the Turkish-Greek border, run through Greece, Albania and the Adriatic Sea, before coming ashore in Italy’s south.

TAP will be 878 kilometers in length (Greece 550 kilometers, Albania 215 kilometers, Adriatic Sea 105 kilometers, and Italy 8 kilometers).

TAP’s shareholding is comprised of BP (20 percent), SOCAR (20 percent), Snam S.p.A. (20 percent), Fluxys (19 percent), Enagás (16 percent) and Axpo (5 percent).

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Follow the author on Twitter: @Lyaman_Zeyn

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