Azernews.Az

A final route of Azerbaijani gas supply to Europe will be selected by the consortium developing the giant Shah Deniz field in the Caspian Sea after the consideration of proposals of Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) and Nabucco pipeline projects, the Turkish energy minister told Anadolu news agency on Tuesday.

Taner Yildiz said Turkey supports both projects, but the choice will be made by the Shah Deniz consortium.

The minister said that the implementation of the project on Azerbaijani gas exports to European markets will not affect Turkey's energy cooperation with other countries.

The Shah Deniz consortium currently considers two options to deliver gas to Europe -- TAP and Nabucco West.

The TAP project is designed to transport gas from the Caspian region via Greece and Albania and across the Adriatic Sea to southern Italy and further into western Europe.

TAP's initial pipeline capacity will be 10 billion cubic metres per year, expandable to 20 billion cubic meters. TAP's shareholders are EGL of Switzerland (42.5 percent), Norway's Statoil (42.5 percent) and E.ON Ruhrgas of Germany (15 percent).

Earlier this year the Shah Deniz consortium made TAP a priority route for export of Azerbaijani gas to Italy.

Later Nabucco West was chosen as the only pipeline project to supply to Central Europe the gas to be extracted during the second stage of Shah Deniz field's development, which is expected to start in late 2017 or early 2018.

Nabucco West is a short-cut version of the Nabucco project, which envisages construction of a pipeline from the Turkish-Bulgarian border to Austria. The project's current shareholders are Bulgarian Energy Holding, Romanian Transgaz, Turkish Botas, Austrian OMV, German RWE and Hungary's FGSZ.

The final decision on a pipeline route will be made in 2013.