Azerbaijan, Baku / Trend corr S. Aliyev / The State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) has approved the project on utilization of formation water of the Azerbaijani International Operating Company.
The BP Vice-President for ACG (Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli) Construction, Bruce Luberski, said at a press briefing on 29 June that the value of the project would be $428mln. Some $115mln has been already spent on the project within the first five months of 2007 and $245mln was used at the beginning.
BP, the operator of the project to develop the ACG fields, publicized the completion of construction of a pipeline within the framework of utilizing formation water.
The volume of formation water will rise due to the increase in oil production in the ACG. Water appears during production of oil and it has to be removed. The water can cause problems as it is very salty and has a small amount of organic matter.
Up to 95% of the formation water appearing in the ACG will be pumped back into the layer before transportation of the oil to Sangachal terminal. The remaining 15% of the water will be removed from the terminal.