BAKU, Azerbaijan, March 15. Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan have increased the total volume of their oil transit through the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline by 34.5 percent from January through February 2024 compared to the same period in 2023, Trend reports, referring to the State Statistics Committee of Azerbaijan.
From January through February 2024, the transit oil share from Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan transported via BTC totaled 842,900 tons, representing 17.8 percent of the total oil pumping volume through the BTC for the first two months of this year," the committee said.
The growth was primarily driven by an increase in the transit of Kazakhstan's oil.
Since March 2023, Kazakhstan has been transferring approximately 120,000 tons of its oil per month via the BTC pipeline.
In 2023, transit oil from Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan constituted 17.4 percent of the overall volume of oil transported through Azerbaijan's strategic BTC pipeline. This amounted to 5.24 million tons, marking a 2.7 percent increase compared to 2022.
The BTC pipeline currently transports oil from the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli block of fields and condensate from the Shah Deniz field, along with SOCAR's (State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic) oil from its production departments and joint ventures, in addition to oil from Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan.
BTC has an annual throughput capacity of over 50 million tons and has been in operation since 2006, supplying oil to the Mediterranean market.