Azernews.Az

By Nigar Abbasova

Energy-rich Kazakhstan may start transportation of oil from its major Kashagan field through Azerbaijan when it launches the next stage of the field’s development.

The Kazakh Energy Ministry told Trend that the need to transport oil through the territory of Azerbaijan will emerge as Kazakhstan starts Phase 2 of Kashagan development. The second phase is expected to take several years, the exact period, however, is not yet known.

Currently, the phase is at the stage of the initial designing.

Currently, the Kashagan oil is exported via pipelines of the Caspian Pipeline Consortium and the Kazakh national company KazTransOil. The increasing volumes of Kazakh oil are expected to be exported by means of the planned Kazakhstan Caspian Transportation System (KCTS) in the future.

The KCTS, which envisages construction of Eskene-Kuryk-Baku pipeline, will consist of oil-discharge terminals located at Kazakh coast of the Caspian Sea, tankers and vessels, oil-discharge terminals on Azerbaijan's coast of the Caspian Sea and connecting facilities to the oil pipeline system “Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan”.

The system is expected to ensure the export of Kazakh oil to international markets mainly from the Kashagan field (second and third phase) via the Caspian Sea, through the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline and other oil transportation systems both in Azerbaijan and other transit countries.

Energy Minister Natig Aliyev earlier said Kazakhstan will be able to daily export 150,000 barrels of Kashagan oil through the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline.

The Kashagan field, which has earned the unfortunate nickname “cash-all-gone” due to a series of expensive overruns, finally started up in October 2016.

The field, first discovered in 2000, is developed by Kazakhstan’s state oil company, KazMunayGas, and a consortium of some of the world’s biggest oil companies, including ExxonMobil and Royal Dutch Shell.

Kashagan is considered to be the world's largest discovery in the last 30 years, combined with the Tengiz Field. The reservoir lies at the depth of some 4,200 meters below the shallow waters of the northern part of the Caspian Sea.

Kazakhstan is seeking to produce the volume ranging from 500,000 to 1 million tons of oil till late 2016, while the expected figure for 2017 ranges from 4 to 7 million tons.

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Nigar Abbasova is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow her on Twitter: @nigyar_abbasova

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