Azerbaijan, Baku, Dec. 10 / Trend E.Ismayilov /
The Sate Oil Company of the Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) has begun the withdrawal of gas from the underground storage facilities of Azerbaijan, a source in SOCAR said on Friday.
Azerbaijan has two underground gas storage facilities - Kalmaz and Garadagh.
The company withdraws gas only from Kalmaz underground gas storage facility yet, the source said.
"Right now, gas withdrawal is carried out only from the Kalmaz store at a level of two million cubic meters of gas per day. The withdrawal of gas from the Garadagh has been suspended," the source said.
Routine repair work needed to prepare for the next season of gas pumping have already been launched at the two gas storage facilities' gas compressor stations.
Following the completion of the gas pumping season, the volume of gas reserves in underground facilities in Azerbaijan amounted to 3.05 billion cubic meters. Of the total amount of gas available in storage facilities, more than 1.13 billion cubic meters remained from last year.
Natural gas reserves in the two gas reservoirs are more than 1.5 billion cubic meters, the source said earlier.
Last year, SOCAR pumped about 2 billion cubic meters of gas into the country's underground gas storage facilities compared to 1.4 billion cubic meters in 2008.
The gas pumping process for use during autumn and winter ends in October. However, due to favorable weather conditions this year, the process has continued until late November.
