BAKU, Azerbaijan, January 26. Prospects for oil transit from Kazakhstan through Azerbaijan are quite high, bp Vice President for the Caspian region Bakhtiyar Aslanbayli in an interview with local media, Trend reports.
"The Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline is operating at maximum capacity. It can take up to 1 million barrels per day, and with additional work, its throughput can be increased to 1.2 million barrels per day. There are free capacities, and the pipeline is ready to accept additional volumes from third parties, such as Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan. The issue of quality of the product is important here, if it differs, then there are certain limits," he said.
However, as the vice president noted, Azerbaijan's transit opportunities are not limited to this pipeline alone. There is also a potential for transporting oil from Kazakhstan via the Baku-Supsa pipeline, as well as by rail.
Earlier, Kazakh Prime Minister Alikhan Smailov said that Kazakhstan will begin transporting 1.5 million tons of oil through Azerbaijan in early 2023.
"We now have an agreement to ship 1.5 million tons of oil in this direction via Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan from January 1, 2023. And a further increase to 6-6.5 million tons is being worked out. According to railway capabilities, TCO has now purchased, doubled the number of tank cars and pilot shipments by rail towards Batumi and Uzbekistan have already begun," Smailov said.
