Azerbaijan, Baku, March 11 /Trend, E. Ismailov/
The decision of the Cabinet of Ministers of Azerbaijan on the final allocation of lands for the enlargement of South Caucasian gas pipeline will be taken in 2014 as was planned by the partners of the "Shah Deniz" project, the manager of BP for land affairs Chingiz Safiguliyev said during public hearings on the enlargement project on Monday.
According to him, the process of issuing compensations to about 4000 land owners will start in 2014. Compensations will be paid to residents of 11 regions situated in the pipeline zone.
The contract will come into effect in 2018 and will remain valid for 60 years, Safiguliyev said.
According to him, compensations will be paid according to the market prices and the current legislation. The construction of the additional line will start in Hajigabul district.
The construction period will cover 2014-2018. A 36-meter construction corridor will be organized for the period of construction, and a 30 meter wide safeguard zone will be created for exploitation.
The enlargement will consist of a parallel 1422-mm pipeline starting from the 56th km of the current one.
This new pipeline with a length of 387 km will make the transportation of an additional 16 billion cubic meters of gas per year possible.
Currently, the consortium developing Shah Deniz field is considering two possible ways of gas transportation to Europe - The Nabucco West project and the Trans-Adriatic pipeline. Within the second stage of development of Shah Deniz Azerbaijan is going to export to Europe 10 billion cubic meters of gas per year.
The first gas from the Shah Deniz-2 project is expected to be extracted in 2018.
Two offshore structures and over 20 underwater wells will be installed for the extraction of an additional 16 billion cubic meters of gas per year. It is expected that the volume of gas extraction can reach 24 billion cubic meters per year within the second development stage.
Reserves of Shah Deniz field are evaluated in 1.2 trillion cubic meters.
The development contract of Shah Deniz field was signed on June 4 1996. The participants of the agreement are: BP (оperator) - 25.5 percent, Statoil - 25.5 percent, NICO - 10 percent, Total - 10 percent, Lukoil - 10 percent, TPAO - 9 percent, SOCAR - 10 percent.