ISTANBUL
Turkey and Azerbaijan signed an agreement to construct a west-bound pipeline that will transport natural gas from Azerbaijan’s Shah Deniz-II field via Georgia to Turkey and on to Europe.
The agreement for the Trans Anatolian Gas Pipeline of TANAP was penned in Istanbul at a ceremony overseen by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Azeri President Ilham Aliyev.
The two countries signed in December 2011 a memorandum of understanding to construct the $7-billion pipeline.
Azerbaijan's state oil company SOCAR will hold an 80-percent stake, and two Turkish state-owned companies Petroleum Pipeline Corporation, (BOTAS) and Turkish Petroleum Corporation (TPAO) will have 10-percent stakes each.
The first stage of a total of four of the project is expected to be completed in 2018.
When completed in 2020, the pipeline would carry 16 billion cubic meters of gas annually and Turkey will buy 6 million cubic meters of it as the rest would be transported to Europe via Bulgaria and/or Greece.
The capacity of the pipeline is estimated to reach 23 million cubic meters in 2023 and to 31 million cubic meters in 2026.
