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BP And Socar Confirm Shah Deniz 2 Pipeline Decision Schedules

BP Vice-President for Shah Deniz Development Al Cook announced a 16 May deadline for the final submission of the Nabucco West and the South East Europe Pipeline (SEEP) tenders to the Shah Deniz evaluation team. His announcement appeared in an interview on 25 April published on the website of the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) consortium. He added that a final decision on the Central European option for delivery of 10 bcm/year of Shah Deniz Stage 2 gas to Europe will be taken by June 2013.

Mr Cook also reiterated the Shah Deniz partners’ decision to eliminate the Interconnector Turkey-Greece-Italy (ITGI) proposal from further consideration, noting that “the selection of TAP as our option for the southern route to Italy should be considered final.” He added that the Shah Deniz partners “are working closely with all stakeholders including the Italian and Greek governments, whose support is crucial for moving the European pipeline project plans forward.”

Mr Cook said that the Shah Deniz consortium considers the proposed Trans Anatolian Pipeline (TANAP) as the optimal choice for transporting Azeri gas via Turkey. “We believe that the TANAP project could be the best way to transport Shah Deniz and future sources of gas across Turkey,” he said. “We will actively support development of robust legal agreements and engineering studies for TANAP so that pipelines like TAP can be confident in receiving gas at the western Turkish border.”

Elshad Nassirov, Vice-President of Azeri state firm Socar and the company’s chief negotiator on Shah Deniz 2, on 2 May told APA news agency that Socar and Turkey’s Botas “aim to complete talks this month and sign the intergovernmental agreement to support TANAP by 30 June.” He also denied recent reports in the Azeri press that Turkey is delaying the talks by demanding an equal share in the joint venture rather than the proposed stake of 20%. “We have not received any proposal from the Turkish side on this,” Mr Nassirov noted. In related news Italy’s Enel announced on 2 May that it was interested in participating “in projects that bring gas to the country,” including “of course the TAP project.” The TAP partners have been lobbying for both Italy and Greece to join their consortium.

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