Baku, Azerbaijan, July 6
By Leman Zeynalova – Trend:
There are opportunities to attract gas from new potential sources to the Southern Gas Corridor (SGC), Vitaly Beglyarbekov, Deputy Vice-President for Investments and Marketing of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) said in an interview with Moscow-Baku information portal.
"We have repeatedly talked about this, and I confirm our interest in attracting gas from new sources, in addition to or on a par with gas from Azerbaijan, into the system of the Southern Gas Corridor. Of course, first and foremost, we are discussing the potential of Azerbaijan itself apart from the "Shah Deniz" field. These are the Absheron field, which is in preparation for the start of production, further expansion of the development of the Umid field and the ideas related to the Babek project united with Umid project, where no major work has started yet. All of them will certainly become the next sources of gas from Azerbaijan for the Southern Gas Corridor," he said.
Beglyarbekov has mentioned the Middle East, Central Asia, or the Eastern Mediterranean among the new potential sources from which gas can be attracted to the Southern Gas Corridor.
"This may be Russian gas as well - we do not make any exceptions or discrimination in this regard, and are ready to work with all producers or owners of gas. The terms of such cooperation are very simple: the supplier must be legitimate and interested in using our system. We have no other restrictions in the presence of commercial agreements," he said.
The opening ceremony of TANAP was held on June 12 in the Turkish province of Eskisehir with the participation of the presidents of Azerbaijan - Ilham Aliyev, Turkey - Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Ukraine - Petro Poroshenko and Serbia - Alexander Vucic.
The launching ceremony of the first phase of the Southern Gas Corridor project was held in Baku on May 29.
The gas from the Azerbaijani Shah Deniz field has already gone through the first segment of the Southern Gas Corridor - from the Sangachal terminal to the expanded South Caucasus Pipeline.. The commissioning of the TANAP gas pipeline has become the next stage, the first commercial gas through which has already entered the territory of Turkey.
The TANAP pipeline is laid from the Georgian-Turkish border to the western border of Turkey. TANAP together with another gas - Transadriatic pipeline (TAP) is part of the "Southern Gas Corridor" project, which provides for the transportation of gas from the Azerbaijani "Shah Deniz" field to Europe.
The initial capacity of the TANAP pipeline is expected to be 16 billion cubic meters of gas per year. About six billion cubic meters will be supplied to Turkey, and the rest - to Europe. After the completion of the TAP, the gas will be delivered to Europe approximately in the early 2020.
The share distribution of TANAP shareholders is as follows: Southern Gas Corridor CJSC - 51 percent, SOCAR Turkey Enerji - 7 percent, BOTAS - 30 percent, and BP - 12 percent.
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