BAKU, Azerbaijan, May 6. Over the course of its field development history, Azerbaijan has extracted 2.22 billion tons of oil and more than 1.05 trillion cubic meters of gas, Director of Azerbaijan's Center for Oil Studies Ilham Shaban said last week, Trend reports.
bp, which has been operating in Azerbaijan for 32 years, said through its Vice President for the Caspian Region Bakhtiyar Aslanbayli that over 4.3 billion barrels of oil have been extracted from the Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli block since 1997.
Additionally, Azerbaijan has obtained over 50 billion cubic meters of associated gas from this block.
From another flagship field of the country, the Shah Deniz gas condensate field, since December 2006 (the start of production) until now, over 209 billion cubic meters of gas have been extracted.
bp also said that its total investment volume in projects in Azerbaijan over its 32 years of operation amounted to $85 billion.
As part of its activities in Azerbaijan, bp opened a laboratory for information technology and cybersecurity at Baku Engineering University on May 3 and launched a new master's program at Sumgayit University.
The Turkish Energy Market Regulatory Authority (EPDK) said last week that Azerbaijan exported over 1.65 billion cubic meters of gas to Türkiye from January through February 2024, which is 2.4 percent less than the same period last year.
In an interview with Sabah newspaper, Minister of Energy and Natural Resources of Türkiye Alparslan Bayraktar, said that the country aims to secure 70–80 percent of its gas purchases through long-term contracts, while the remaining portion will be obtained from the spot market.
The Turkish minister mentioned ongoing contract restructuring for pipeline and liquefied natural gas (LNG) imports, as well as ongoing negotiations for pipeline gas with Russia, Azerbaijan, and Iran.
Bayraktar also noted that Türkiye negotiates with ExxonMobil on a multi-billion-dollar deal to purchase LNG on a medium- or long-term basis and, overall, aims to expand its LNG procurement portfolio.
Last week, the Turkish parliament passed a bill allowing the country to sell imported natural gas in liquefied form.
Its adoption will enable the establishment of facilities for liquefying imported natural gas in Turkey, as well as strengthen the legislative framework necessary to transform the country into an international gas trading hub.
Technical issues have delayed the start of commercial operation of the Greek liquefied natural gas terminal, Alexandroupolis LNG, which has a capacity of 5.5 billion cubic meters of gas per year, from mid-May to late May or early June.
The Alexandroupolis LNG terminal will facilitate gas delivery to end consumers in Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, North Macedonia, Serbia, and further to Moldova and Ukraine, as well as Hungary and Slovakia.
The Greek DESFA company said last week that the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP, the European part of the Southern Gas Corridor) through the Nea Mesimvria gas distribution point provided 17.5 percent of Greece's total gas imports, or 2.9 terawatt-hours (TWh), from January to March 2024. Recall that since December 2020, Greece has been receiving gas from the Azerbaijani Shah Deniz field via the Southern Gas Corridor.
The EU announced its exploration of a new gas pipeline initiative, the Solidarity Ring for Caspian Gas, and a source in the Czech Ministry of Industry and Trade expressed interest in this project.
Last week, the Brussels-based EU Reporter news platform published an article noting that Caspian gas has become a guarantee of stability for several European countries.
The article stated that President Ilham Aliyev and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen agreed to boost gas supplies to Europe to 20 billion cubic meters annually in a memorandum they signed in the summer of 2022.
In line with plans to boost gas transit to the EU, George Satlas, Executive Director of ICGB AD (operator of the Greece-Bulgaria gas interconnector, IGB, linked to the Southern Gas Corridor), announced last week that the capacity of IGB will increase from three billion cubic meters per year to five billion cubic meters per year by the end of 2025 or the beginning of 2026.
Meanwhile, on May 3, the energy ministers of Azerbaijan and Saudi Arabia discussed joint cooperation and investment opportunities between the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) and Saudi Arabian companies in Baku.
The Azerbaijani Ministry of Energy clarified that they discussed joint cooperation in the areas of oil refining, petrochemical product supply, low-carbon fuels, and technologies.
Azerbaijan's Minister of Economy Mikayil Jabbarov discussed prospects for cooperation in the energy sector during a visit to Tashkent on May 1–2, during a meeting with Uzbekistan's Minister of Investments, Industry, and Trade Laziz Kudratov.
Azerbaijan's Minister of Energy Parviz Shahbazov has been invited to the Kyrgyzstan Energy Forum in Vienna, organized by the World Bank and the Ministry of Energy of Kyrgyzstan, which will be held on June 10–11.