Azerbaijan Key Projects and Business Highlights
With giant projects such as Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli (ACG), the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline, and the Shah Deniz Phase-2, Azerbaijan has joined the largest producing countries of natural gas.
The reserves of the Caspian Sea offshore Azerbaijan have attracted all the major companies BP, Inpex, Chevron, Itochu, Hess, Statoil , Total or Turkish Petroleum among others.
The State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) was established in 1992 to represent the interests of the country in all the joint ventures with the foreign companies willing to explore and produce natural gas from Azerbaijan reserves.
Originally focusing on the upstream sector to develop the national resources and the midstream infrastructures to export the gas, SOCAR is now putting attention on the downstream activities to create a local petrochemical industry.
In that respect the Baku Refinery and Petrochemical integrated complex reflects the intention of Azerbaiijan to reduce its reliance on natural resources export to develop the manufacturing sector.
In a context where the US shale gas put a high pressure on the gas prices all over the world, all the solutions to monetize the natural locally will have a strategic interest for Azerbaijan even though this country will continue to support giant export projects such as the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) project.
KBR wins Azeri OGPC Gas Processing Plant PMC
The State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) selected the Houston-based engineering company KBR to provide project management consultancy (PMC) for the front end engineering and design (FEED) of the gas processing plant (GPP) within its Oil & Gas Processing and Petrochemical Complex (OGPC) project in Azerbaijan.
Statoil and SOCAR increase cooperation in Azerbaijan
In January 2013, the Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide supported by Statoil International development and production chief Lars Christian Bacher paid a state visit to Azerbaijan President Ilham Aliyev to promote the Norway national oil company to increase the partnership with the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan(SOCAR) to develop the giant Umid gas field in the Azeri Caspian Sea.
Baku Oil & Gas and Petrochemical complex
Established in 1992 from the Azerineft State Concern and Azerneftkimya Production Association, the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) received the mandate as national oil company to improve the management structure of the oil and gas industry and develop the energy sector.
BP votes for the FEED of Shah Deniz Stage-2
Shah Deniz Stage 2, or Full Field Development (FFD), is a giant project that will bring gas from Azerbaijan to Europe and Turkey. This will increase gas supply and energy security to European markets through the opening of the new Southern Gas Corridor.
With capital expenditure estimated at $25 billion, the Shah Deniz Stage 2 project makes a major step forward with the approval by the Shah Deniz Consortium to start the FEED.
Shah Deniz-2 partners selected TAP over Nabucco
The Shah Deniz-2 partners, BP from UK, Total from France and the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) have preferred the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) project over Nabucco to export their natural gas from Azerbaijan to Europe.
