SOCAR, BP to build waste recycling center in Baku
By Nigar Orujova
Azerbaijan's energy company SOCAR and BP will build a waste recycling center in the Garadagh district of Baku, a senior SOCAR official has said.
The center will be built for processing mainly oil and drill cuttings and formation waters, Rafiga Huseynzade, SOCAR Vice President for the Environment, said at the Caspian Oil and Gas 2013 conference in Baku on June 6.
The cost of the project is estimated at $60 million. Funding will be provided by SOCAR and BP at a 50 to 50 ratio, Huseynzade noted.
A tender will be announced in the near future, and construction work will start after selecting a contractor.
The recycling center is expected to be commissioned in late 2013 or early 2014.
According to Huseynzade, SOCAR's current waste management center is outdated and does not have the capacity to process all necessary types of waste. BP is also in need of such a facility.
Regarding the cooperation between SOCAR and BP, Huseynzade said installation of a unit for the collection of associated gas at the Chirag field -- part of the major Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli (ACG) fields in the Caspian Sea -- is scheduled for completion this month and will reduce emissions of associated gas to two percent as well as further bring the figure down to zero in the future.
In order to ensure that the system designed to manage wastes generated at SOCAR enterprises operates efficiently, works on collection, sorting, transportation, utilization and burial of waste are carried out in the frame of the Waste Management Plan.
According to the Plan, production waste and drilling sludge are handed over to the Waste Center of the SOCAR Environmental Department.
The landfill for disposal of oil sludge began operation in 1985 and currently needs reconstruction.
In 2011, US company M-I LLC submitted a feasibility study on the construction of the recycling and waste management center for SOCAR.