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By Trend

Georgia will store gas from Azerbaijan’s Shah Deniz field in its underground gas storage facility to be built on Samgori South Dome Field, Georgia’s Energy Minister Ilia Eloshvili said in an exclusive interview with Trend.

"Georgian Oil and Gas Corporation (GOGC) plans to construct a gas storage reservoir in a depleted oil field in Georgia. As Georgia currently has no gas storage facilities, this project is strategic for the government of Georgia and GOGC," he added.

The gas storage facility is also linked to the Shah Deniz consortium plans to raise output to 26.1 billion cubic meters per year by 2021, said the minister, adding that this will triple gas volumes exported through the territory of Georgia and multiply proportional benefit to GOGC from the midstream contracts.

"The gas storage project will guarantee uninterrupted gas supply of vulnerable consumers (household consumers and thermal power plants) in the critical situations as required by the EU Acquis on Energy – treaty establishing the EU Energy Community, significantly improve Georgia’s energy security, manage the seasonal supply/demand misbalances, ensure establishment of competitive gas market in Georgia and support integration of local market with European Energy Community Gas Market," said Eloshvili.

Georgian Oil and Gas Corporation announced an open international tender on July 14 for engineering, procurement, installation, commissioning services for the construction of Underground Gas Storage (USG) on Samgori South Dome Field.

Construction work for the USG project is planned to start in early 2018. Within the frames of the first stage of construction, two appraisal wells are to be drilled. The USG is planned to be completed by 2021.

After the completion of the underground gas storage project, the facility will be capable to store 210-280 million cubic meters of gas.

The total cost of the UGS IS currently estimated at around $270 million.

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