Azerbaijan, Baku, July 13 /Trend E.Ismayilov/
State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) plans to build four offshore drilling rigs to conduct operations in the Caspian Sea within five years, head of SOCAR Rovnag Abdullayev said during a meeting with students receiving education abroad, scholarships and accepted to work in the scholarship program.
He said the creation of a new fleet of drilling rigs may require investment of $1 billion.
"Most of the work in the oil and gas sector is carried out in the sea, so the implementation of existing projects, the discovery of new fields and plans for exploratory drilling require additional facilities," he said.
SOCAR noted previously that the construction of the first new floating drilling rig is scheduled to begin this year, the second - in 2013.
Earlier, SOCAR has taken a policy decision to invest in building new rigs of last generation, from which it will be possible to drill exploratory and development wells to a depth of 8-10 thousand meters in water depths up to 1,000 meters.
The construction of this new installation costs up to $500 million. The cost of installing the latest (Heydar Aliyev drilling rig) was$250 million, head of SOCAR Rovnag Abdullayev said.