9 Nisan 2011 Cumartesi

Turkish-Azeri Gas transit deal may ease caspian supply to Europe


Bloomberg 

Turkey and Azerbaijan will sign a deal for the transit for gas from the Shah Deniz-2 Caspian Sea deposit “shortly,” according to an Azeri official, boosting European plans to diversify supplies away from Russia.
“Everything will be signed very shortly, in several weeks,” Elshad Nassirov, vice president for marketing and investment at the State Oil Co. of Azerbaijan, or Socar, said in an interview in the Azeri capital Baku late Thursday.

All major issues, such as the price and volume of gas to be sold to Turkey from Shah Deniz-2, as well as tariffs for the transportation of fuel through the existing and future pipelines in Turkey have been agreed upon, Nassirov said, without providing details.

The European Union is looking to the Caspian, including Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan, to diversify supply, offset dwindling production and reduce dependence on Russia. Pipeline projects in the bloc’s so-called southern corridor, including OMV-led Nabucco, are seeking supply from Shah Deniz, one of the world’s biggest deposits, as is Russia’s Gazprom.

The Nabucco project to deliver this gas across Turkey to the EU is vying with smaller volume pipelines such as the Interconnector Turkey-Greece-Italy, or ITGI, led by Edison SpA and Depa, and the Statoil and Elektrizitaets-Gesellschaft Laufenburg -led Trans Adriatic Pipeline, or TAP.

Azeri and Turkish leaders signed a trade accord on June 7 setting up the framework for future sales and transit allowing BP Plc, Statoil, Socar and other partners in Shah Deniz-2 to begin talks with customers. At the time, Socar expected the agreement to become final by February.

‘Crucial for Nabucco’
“They can’t develop Shah Deniz-2 until they’ve got a way to get the gas out,” Julian Lee, a senior energy analyst at the London-based Centre for Global Energy Studies, said Friday by telephone. “It is as crucial for Nabucco as it is for other pipeline projects that transit resources across Turkey that this be finalized.”
The venture to tap Shah Deniz, which translates as King of the Sea, aims to choose one of the three pipeline projects by the end of this year, Nassirov said.

There has been a “slight delay” on the investment decision on the Shah Deniz-2 deposit, Nassirov said, without providing further detail. That decision for the $20 billion project had been planned for mid-year, Olav Skalmeraas, a Statoil vice president, said in November.

The longer that Azerbaijan goes without a resolution with Turkey the more it will either have to accept delays or be forced to seek other export routes, such as Russia or Iran or more speculative projects to liquefy gas, Lee said.

‘Doors are open’
Gazprom’s interest in buying all the volumes from the deposit may not be possible because of commercial risks of entrusting a single buyer with sales for 20 to 25 years, Nassirov said.

“We understand that it is very difficult to provide guarantees of that scope,” he said. “Still, the doors are open.”

The Turkish transit agreement only requires “minor” issues such as the impact of inflation on transit tariffs, Nassirov said. He did not give any figures on the volumes or price of gas to be sold to Turkey or on transit tariffs.

BP and Statoil each own 25.5 percent of Shah Deniz. Socar, Lukoil, Naftiran Intertrade and Total hold 10 percent each and Türkiye Petrolleri owns 9 percent.

Shah Deniz has 30 trillion cubic feet of gas in place, making it “one of the world’s giant gas fields,” Brian Hunter, gas marketing manager for Shah Deniz, said in November.

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