The Azerbaijan State Oil Company (SOCAR) is not currently discussing the issues of the free-laying gas exploration at Azeri-Chiraq-Guneshli field (ACG) with the Azerbaijani International Operative company (AIOC), the SOCAR first vice president on geology and geo-physics, Hoshbaht Yusifzadeh told Trend.
This agreement will be a subject of separate talks. AIOC is very interested in this project. They work on the given field and therefore, want to take control over the exploration of the lower layers of gas, he said.
SOCAR did not yet decide anything on that matter. AIOC offered to start the talks on free gas exploration. We will announce a tender on
this project and if they win it, they can develop it, Yusifzadeh said.
ACG is developed by BP (operator- 34, 1%), Unocal (10, 2%), SOCAR (10%), INPEX (10%), Statoil (8, 6%), ExxonMobil (8%), TPAO (6, 8%), Devon (5, 6%), ITOCHU (3, 9%), Amerada Hess (2, 7%). However, all agreements on ACG cover only oil exploration. Whereas, free gas deposits are subjects of a different dimension. Today, gas exploration is only developing at the higher layers, however, there are larger deposits supposedly existing at a lower layers. As soon as they will be uncovered in the course of drilling it is expected to sign separate contract for each of them.