Azerbaijan, Baku, April 4 / Trend A.Badalova /
The Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) will be able to tranport more gas from different sources as new gas reserves come on stream, TAP official representative told Trend.
"TAP is being built to initially transport 10 billion cubic metres of Shah Deniz II gas per annum - currently the only volumes of gas available today," the official wrote Trend in an e-mail.
"Of course, as further gas reserves come on stream in the future, TAP capacity can easily more than double and the pipeline will be able to transport other gas volumes, as and when they become available," the official added.
Earlier Turkish media reported with the reference to director of External Relations of TAP Michael Hoffman that gas produced in the Kurdish autonomy of Iraq can be transported to Europe via TAP. "We are considering gas transportation from the Kurdish Autonomy of Iraq to Europe as plan B. When coming to gas from Russia or Iran, these options are not being considered," Hoffmann said during the meeting with representatives of the Energy Ministry of Turkey.
TAP project is designed to transport gas from the Caspian region via Greece and Albania and across the Adriatic Sea to southern Italy and further into Western Europe. Gas to be produced within the second phase of Azerbaijani Shah Deniz gas condensate field development is considered as the main source for TAP.
TAP's initial pipeline capacity will be 10 billion cubic meters per year, but is easily expandable to 20 billion cubic meters per year. TAP's shareholders are AXPO of Switzerland (42.5 percent), Norway's Statoil (42.5 percent) and E.ON Ruhrgas of Germany (15 percent). In case of choosing TAP as a final pipeline route to transport Azerbaijani gas to Europe, the construction of the pipeline will start in 2015.
Earlier TAP and Nabucco Gas Pipeline International submitted their final offers to the Shah Deniz consortium. The transportation offers include substantial information about the technical, regulatory, financial and other aspects of these two projcts.
The final decision on the European pipeline is expected to be made by end of June 2013.
