Azerbaijan, Baku / corr. Trend S.Aliyev / The experts questioned by Trend said that transporting all volumes of the Kazakh oil via the territory of Russia as stated by Kazakh President, Nursultan Nazarbayev, is technically impossible. According to the experts it particularly deals with the transportation of oil, produced by several countries in Kazakhstan, via Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline.
Four companies who are shareholders to the BTC project (ENI, INPEX, ConocoPhillips and Chevron), work on Kashagan field in Kazakhstan and possess 15% of participation share in the pipeline. A document was signed in Kazakhstan in January to create Kazakhstan-Caspian Transportation System (KCTS), which will transport Kazakh oil to BTC pipeline.
KCTS will comprise of terminals in the Kazakh section of Caspian, a pipeline up to Kurik and tanker flotilla. The creation of the system will be invested in by the participants of Kashakan and Tengiz projects, with the project being estimated at $3 bln. Nearly 350.000 barrels of oil per day are planned to be transported via BTC from the beginning of oil production in Kashagan to 2010. The length of the pipeline, which extends from Astau oil producing station in Karagandin region to Alashankou railway station in China, is 962 km and has a diameter of 813 mm.
On 16 June 2006, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan signed an Inter-Governmental Agreement on the transportation of Kazakh oil via BTC. Presently a transport agreement is expected to be signed. In addition Kazakhstan has a pipeline to transport oil to China. The capacity of the Atasu-Alashankow pipeline will be 10 mln tons per year in the first stage and 20 mln in the second stage.
The experts say that during peak oil production, Kazakhstan will incur a decrease in export capacity, even if the Country uses all existing routes. In 2006 Kazakhstan exported 57.2 mln tons of oil, the Kazakh oil is mainly exported to the European markets via Caspian Pipeline Consortium and Atirau-Samara pipeline.