Azerbaijan, Baku / corr Trend U.Ismayilova / Sabit Bagirov, the former President of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR), head of the Fund for Assistance to Entrepreneurship and Market Economy stated on 18 May that Azerbaijan can partially pump its oil via the Odessa-Brody pipeline in presence of political dividends.
The meeting of the Presidents of Azerbaijan, Georgia, Ukraine, Lithuania, Poland and representatives of Kazakhstan last week at the energy summit in Krakow made a decision on intensifying the cooperation through the commencement of intergovernmental agreements, which will regulate countries' and companies' participation in the project on Caspian oil transportation to the European and world markets via the Odessa-Brody pipeline.
During the summit the parties agreed on establishment of a joint venture (JV) for management over the Odessa-Brody pipeline which is 667km long. The Odessa-Brody oil pipeline was commissioned in August 2001.
Bagirov noted that the considerable part of oil which is currently produced and the volume expected to be produced over the next ten to fifteen years in Azerbaijan under current projects will be pumped via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) export oil pipeline.
"However, in presence of not so heavy transit terms, Azerbaijani oil pumping in small volumes is fully possible," he added. All new pipelines in the region - the Burgas - Aleksandrupolis, Odessa-Brody and Samsun-Ceyhan will affect the profitability of BTC.
According to the expert, the pipelines open up competitive opportunities, taking into consideration the capacity of these pipelines. "Obviously, they will attract not only the Azerbaijani oil, but also Kazakh, Russian, and Turkmen oil," he added.