Azernews.Az

By Gunay Hasanova

Enjoying the largest natural gas reserves among the Central Asia countries and the world’s sixth largest reserves, Turkmenistan intends to increase the export of its energy.

Turkmenistan intends to diversify its supplies of electricity, said President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov during the ceremony of commissioning of the control center in Ashgabat, the newspaper "Neutral Turkmenistan" reported on October 19.

"Measures taken in this area can fully provide electricity to consumers in the country, and its excess can be supplied to the neighboring countries: Afghanistan and Iran”, he said.

He pointed out that Turkmenistan intends to diversify the direction of supplies and increase its volumes in the future.

Under the Concept of Electric Power Industry Development of Turkmenistan for 2013-2020, it is planned to construct 14 gas turbine power plants in the country's various regions.

Currently, 6 power plants were built and put into operation in Akhal, Lebap, and Mary provinces.

Combined steam-gas power plant is being constructed rapidly on the territory of Mary province.

In addition, the construction of the section of Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India gas pipeline passing through the territory of Turkmenistan, which also provides a parallel construction of the high-voltage electrical system, started in December 2015.

Earlier it was reported that Turkmenistan is engaged in the exploration of the possibilities for the export of Turkmen electricity to Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Pakistan and the Caucasus countries.

Previously, the country’s energy ministry reported that the volume of electricity output amounted to 22.5 billion kilowatts per hour in 2015. Export volume to neighboring countries in this period was at the level of 3.2 billion kilowatts per hour.

Turkmenistan plans to increase its electricity output up to 27.4 and 35.5 billion kilowatts per hour by 2020 and 2030 respectively, according to the country’s power industry development plan.

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Gunay Hasanova is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @gunhasanova

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