BAKU, Azerbaijan, Nov.17
By Leman Zeynalova – Trend:
The start of commercial operations means that the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) is ready to transport gas, Vugar Veysalov, TAP Head of External Affairs, told Trend.
“Any actual gas flows are up to the shippers’ choices, which they exercise through the daily nomination of the capacity they have booked in TAP.
There is no ramp-up foreseen in TAP’s technical capacity. We cannot comment on any ramp-up in the actual flows, as this will be determined by our shippers,” he said.
Four and a half years after the inauguration of construction works in Thessaloniki, the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), an 878-km gas transportation system crossing Greece, Albania, the Adriatic Sea and Italy, began commercial operations.
TAP’s shareholding is comprised of bp (20 percent), SOCAR (20 percent), Snam (20 percent), Fluxys (19 percent), Enagás (16 percent) and Axpo (5 percent).
TAP’s shareholders have passed the resolution on the development and construction of the project at the end of 2013.
A few facts and figures on what the TAP project has entailed so far:
Traveling through Greece (550 km), Albania (215 km), under the Adriatic Sea (105 km) and coming ashore in Italy (8 km).
Laying approximately 55,000 pieces of pipe, weighing a total of 520,000 tonnes; from an altitude of 2,100m in the Albanian mountains to a depth of 810m in the Adriatic Sea.
Working over 50 million man-hours and driving around 140 million kilometres, without any major incident – a world-class safety record.
Securing €3.9 billion for project financing and complying with the lenders' robust social and environmental requirements.
Continuously engaging with the communities along the pipeline route, TAP established trustful relationships and implemented a wide range of social and environmental investments, improving livelihoods.
Building a strong company culture based on the values of excellence, people, integrity and responsibility, and summarized in the motto "how we achieve our results is just as important as the results themselves.
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