Baku, Azerbaijan, May 31
By Leman Zeynalova – Trend:
The Trans Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP) still has some room for additional cost savings, head of TANAP consortium Saltuk Duzyol said in an exclusive interview with Trend.
“Indeed, we have spent more or less $7 billion to realize the project. When we took the final investment decision, the initial estimated cost was $11.7 billion. So there has been also a huge cost saving equivalent of $4.8 billion. And there is still some room for additional cost savings,” he said.
Duzyol noted that it was a successful project, which was delivered under budget and on time.
He went on to add that Turkey is realizing such kind of projects for quite a long time in close collaboration with Azerbaijan.
“This started with Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline project, continued with Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum gas pipeline project. Turkey is using Azerbaijani gas since 2007 under the contract, which was signed in 2001 for 6.6 billion cubic meters. After the realization of TANAP, Turkey will be using per year 12.6 billion cubic meters of Azerbaijani gas,” said the consortium head.
Duzyol pointed out that Azerbaijan’s portion in the total gas consumption of Turkey is increasing in recent years.
“Turkey with TANAP project will contribute to supply security and diversity a lot. TANAP will definitely bring some supply flexibility to Turkish network, because using TANAP system BOTAS will be able to transport huge volumes of Azerbaijani gas directly to consumption centers, which are to the west of Eskisehir, which is the off-take point of Turkey. Currently, 66 percent of the total consumption accounts for the west of Eskisehir in Turkey, which means flexibility from the operational point of view. Apart from that Turkey will gain significant tax revenues from TANAP project,” he said.
The consortium head noted that during the investment stage TANAP also provided a lot of jobs for Turkish people.
“At the peak level, more than 13,000 people were involved in the project. Turkey has some ambitions to become a gas corridor and an energy hub in the region. TANAP will contribute to the greatest extent possible to achieve this final goal,” Duzyol added.
The TANAP pipeline runs from the Georgian-Turkish border to the country’s western border with Greece. TANAP, together with the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), is part of the Southern Gas Corridor project, which provides the transportation of gas from Azerbaijan’s Shah Deniz field to Europe.
The initial capacity of the TANAP pipeline is expected to be 16 billion cubic meters of gas per year. About 6 billion cubic meters will be supplied to Turkey, while the rest will be supplied to Europe. After the completion of the construction of TAP, gas flow to Europe will being by early 2020.
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