BAKU, Azerbaijan, July 29. The State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) is holding consultations with TotalEnergies and ADNOC (Abu Dhabi National Oil Company) on natural gas operations from the full-scale development of the Caspian Absheron field, with the situation expected to become clear in 2025, an informed source told Trend.
"The Absheron gas-condensate project shareholders will approve the Front End Engineering Design (FEED), the basis for the full-scale development of this field, by the end of 2024. A few months after that, in 2025, the final investment decision (FID) is expected to be made, which will initiate the full-scale development of Absheron.
By the time the FID is made, it will be clear whether SOCAR will decide to buy the gas from the full-scale development, as it did during the first phase of Absheron development, or if there will be a different scheme for handling the gas from this field," the source explained.
Gas and condensate extraction from Absheron has been carried out since July 2023 by JOCAP (Joint Operating Company of Absheron Petroleum) based on an early production project with one deepwater well.
According to an agreement with partners, SOCAR buys this gas, while the condensate is transported via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline.
Over a year of gas extraction from Absheron, the field has produced more than 1.5 billion cubic meters of gas and about 580,000 tons of condensate (from July 2023 to July 2024).
Full-scale development of Absheron will allow for the extraction of up to 6 billion cubic meters of gas per year at peak production.
During the oil and gas conference in Baku in June 2024, the project participants — TotalEnergies (35 percent), SOCAR (35 percent), and ADNOC (30 percent)—reported that production from the second phase of Absheron development could peak at 110,000 barrels per day (including 35,000 barrels per day of condensate) from three or more additional deepwater wells.
Absheron yielded 800 million cubic meters of natural gas and 300,000 tons of condensate in 2023. The gas was used domestically, while the condensate was exported via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline.
The contract area of the field is 747 square kilometers, located 100 km from Baku at a sea depth of 500 meters.
The reserves are estimated at 350–400 billion cubic meters of gas.