BAKU, Azerbaijan, Sept.10
By Leman Zeynalova – Trend:
Opening of new compressor stations could be expected during the replication stage of the Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMA) project of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and Azerbaijan’s state oil company SOCAR, UNDP told Trend.
“NAMA project reflects innovative approaches that have made a huge contribution to greenhouse gas mitigation through a range of energy efficiency upgrades. Thus, within the project, a range of energy-efficient innovative measures have been implemented in SOCAR administrative and service buildings in Garadag, Gala settlements and Sumgayit with total floor area of 10 thousand square meters, including the installation of six Wind Turbines with 24 kW of total installed capacity and Solar PV Panels with a total capacity of 63 kW in order to provide the facilities with economically efficient and eco-friendly energy.
“Among the measures taken under the NAMA project, the SOCAR's Transportation Fleet has been equipped with the ECO-driving simulator, an eco-friendly solution to reduce fuel consumption and operative costs. Adapted to the road infrastructure, traffic regulations and climatic conditions of Azerbaijan, the simulator has an opportunity to train annually up to 1,000 drivers of cars, buses and trucks, making it possible to reduce the emissions of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. According to the calculations of the training results, economic, ecological and safe driving skills can save annually approximately 600.000 litters of fuel, or 5 percent of total used fuel for SOCAR.
“Three compressor stations were established and connected to SOCAR infrastructure for delivering collected associated gas to the population of nearby villages. At this point, there are no plans of opening additional new compressor stations. However, since NAMA being a pilot project envisages replication of its achievements to SOCAR and in further future to the whole country, opening of new compressor stations could be expected during the project’s replication stage.
“The main focus of our project is on the introduction of energy saving practices. Thus, we would rather use this term, stating that the project helped to achieve energy saving estimated as 5,890,725 kW/hour/year, which corresponds to 515.185 tonnes of oil equivalent (TOE), according to the latest data,” said UNDP.
The specific objective of the project is to support SOCAR in the implementation of its Climate Change Strategy. Promoting and up-scaling greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation measures is introduced and implemented during project period. Thus, pilot investments are directed into energy efficiency and low carbon technologies in the country. The NAMA project is jointly financed by the Global Environment Facility (GEF), UNDP and SOCAR and will be implemented by SOCAR and UNDP Azerbaijan.
The project is addressing the existing challenges to improve the energy performance of main end-use sectors, namely buildings and transportation. Vented and flared gas from existing on-shore oil and gas fields is captured through the mitigation activities and later is utilized as a fuel source for nearby residential areas that are otherwise affected by large-scale deforestation activities. The project is consistent with International Climate Change Mitigation Objectives.
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