Azernews.Az

By Sara Israfilbayova

The Absheron field will be put into operation in 2019 with a daily output of 4 million cubic meters of natural gas.

SOCAR President Rovnag Abdullayev made the remark at an event dedicated to the Oilmen Day - September 20 in Baku.

The SOCAR President stressed that at the first stage it is planned to produce 1.5 billion cubic meters of gas and bring the figure up to 5 billion cubic meters of gas in the second stage covering 2020-2023.

The Absheron gas field is an offshore natural gas field in the Caspian Sea. Absheron’s reserves are estimated at 350 billion cubic meters of gas and 45 million tons of condensate, according to the estimations of SOCAR geologists.

Participants of the Absheron project are SOCAR (40 percent), and French companies TOTAL (40 percent) and Engie (20 percent).

Abdullayev further said that about 85 billion cubic meters of gas has been produced at the Shah Deniz field, adding that to date, 21.2 million tons of condensate have been extracted from the field.

The Shah Deniz, discovered in 1999, is one of the world’s largest gas-condensate fields. The field is located on the deep water shelf of the Caspian Sea, 70 km south-east of Baku, in water depths ranging from 50 to 500 m. Shah Deniz field's reserves are estimated at 1.2 trillion cubic meters of gas.

Abdullayev added that overall 25.6 million tons of oil and 18.7 billion cubic meters of gas were produced in Azerbaijan over eight months of 2017.

"Five million tons of oil and four billion cubic meters of gas accounted for SOCAR," he said.

Shah Deniz Stage 1 has the capacity to produce around 10 billion cubic meters of gas per annum (bcma) and approximately 50,000 barrels a day of condensate. Shah Deniz Stage 2, or Full Field Development (FFD) will add a further 16 bcma of gas production to the approximately 9 bcma produced by Shah Deniz Stage 1.

The project Shah Deniz Stage 2 is now over 92% complete in terms of engineering, procurement and construction, and remains on target for first gas from Shah Deniz Stage 2 in 2018. The gas will be exported to Turkey and European markets by expanding the South Caucasus Pipeline and the construction of Trans Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline and Trans Adriatic Pipeline.

Abdullayev further spoke about the company assets in Turkey, noting that annual income of Azerbaijan’s economy from the Star oil refinery, being constructed by SOCAR on Aliaga Peninsula in Turkey, will exceed $600 million within the first five years after its commissioning.

Over the next 10 years, the annual income will exceed $800 million, according to him.

“The refinery’s construction will be completed in the second half of 2018. The refinery will primarily provide naphtha to the Petkim petrochemical complex, which aims to take up to 30 percent share of the Turkish market,” Abdullayev said.

SOCAR, being the largest foreign investor in Turkey, is the author of very important and large-scale projects in the energy industry. SOCAR entered the Turkish market with the acquisition of Petkim. The company’s investments in Turkey will be a total of $19.5 billion once they are completed -Petlim, STAR Oil Refinery, Petkim Wind Power Plant (WPP) and TANAP projects.

Abdullayev went on to say that construction of the Trans-Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP) has been completed by 82 percent.

He said the TANAP section to Turkey’s Eskisehir will be ready by mid-2018, adding that the work to expand the South Caucasus Pipeline has been completed by over 90 percent.

The Trans-Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP) project envisages transportation of gas from Azerbaijan's Shah Deniz field to the western borders of Turkey. The gas will be delivered to Turkey in 2018 and after completion of the Trans Adriatic Pipeline's construction the gas will be delivered to Europe in early 2020.

The length of TANAP is 1,850 kilometers with an initial capacity of 16 billion cubic meters of gas. Around six billion cubic meters of this gas is meant to be delivered to Turkey, with the remaining volume to be supplied to Europe. The project’s total cost is estimated at $8.5 billion.

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