Turkey Consumed 55% of Azeri Shah Deniz Gas
The volume of gas extracted from Shah Deniz field in Azerbaijan reached 64 billion cubic meters from the commencing date of this project to September 1, 2015, the First Vice President of State Oil Company of Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) in Geology Geophysics & Field Development Issues, Khoshbakht Yusifzade, announced.
He mentioned in an article Published in Daily Azerbaijan that during this period 16.3 million tons of gas condensate was also produced from the offshore field.
Azerbaijan commenced Shah Deniz Stage 1 (SD1) on July 3, 2007. Since this period, 4.7 billion cubic meter of gas (bcm) has been exported to Georgia, 35.4 bcm delivered to Turkey and 24 bcm consumed domestically.
Last year, Azerbaijan produced 9.9 bcm of gas and 2.3 million tons of condensate from SD1. In the first half of the 2015, natural gas and condensate production from this field stood at 5.2 bcm abd 1.2 million tons, some 0.45 bcm and 0.8 million tons more than the same period in the last year.
However, despite this increase, SD1’s production level is not expected to exceed the last years volume in 2015. BP-Azerbaijan says the production volume of SD1 would remain unchanged, because the maintenance and modernization of a platform and some other issues led to suspending production for 3 weeks in August.
Over the summer, Azerbaijan exported 18.5 million cubic meter per day (mcm/d)of total produced 27 mcm/d gas from SD1 to Turkish market, while 2.5 mcm/d of gas was delivered to Georgia.
The contract for development of the Shah Deniz offshore field was signed on June 4, 1996. The field’s reserve is estimated at 1.2 trillion cubic meters of gas. The shareholders are: BP, operator (28.8 percent), AzSD (10 percent), SGC Upstream (6.7 percent), Petronas (15.5 percent), Lukoil (10 percent), NICO (10 percent) and TPAO (19 percent).
As part of the Stage 2 of the Shah Deniz development, initially some 16 bcm per annum of 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 by 2021.