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South Caucasus Pipeline
South Caucasus Pipeline
	Location of the South Caucasus Pipeline
Location
Country	Azerbaijan; Georgia; Turkey
General direction	East–west
From	Baku (Sangachal Terminal), Azerbaijan
Passes through	Tbilisi
To	Erzurum, Turkey
Runs alongside	Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan pipeline
General information
Type	Natural gas
Partners	BP (29.99%); Lukoil (19.99%); TPAO (19.00%); SOCAR (14.35%); NICO (10.00%); SGC Upstream (6.67%)
Operator	BP
Commissioned	2006
Technical information
Length	692 km (430 mi)
Maximum discharge	24 billion cubic metres per annum (850×109 cu ft/a)
Diameter	42 in (1,067 mm)

The South Caucasus Pipeline (also known as Baku–Tbilisi–Erzurum Pipeline, BTE pipeline, or Shah Deniz Pipeline) is a natural gas pipeline from the Shah Deniz gas field in the Azerbaijan sector of the Caspian Sea to Turkey. It runs parallel to the Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan pipeline (oil).

History

On 21 May 2006, the commissioning gas was pumped to the pipeline from the Sangachal Terminal.^[1] First deliveries through the pipeline commenced on 30 September 2006. Deliveries of gas from Shah Deniz gas field started on 15 December 2006.^[2]

On 12 August 2008, the pipeline operator BP closed the pipeline for safety reasons because of the South Ossetia conflict.^[3] Gas supplies were resumed on 14 August 2008.^[4]

Description

The 42-inch (1,070 mm) diameter gas pipeline runs through the same corridor as the Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan pipeline until Erzurum, where BTC turns south to the Mediterranean. It is 692 kilometres (430 mi) long, of which 442 kilometres (275 mi) is in Azerbaijan and 248 kilometres (154 mi) in Georgia.^[1] The initial capacity of the pipeline was 8.8 billion cubic metres (310 billion cubic feet) of gas per year.^[5] For the second stage of the Shah Deniz development, the capacity was increased up to 24 billion cubic metres (850 billion cubic feet) by adding additional looping and two new compressor stations,^[6] costing $3 billion.^[7] As the pipeline has the potential to be connected to Turkmen and Kazakh producers through the planned Trans-Caspian Gas Pipeline, Azerbaijan has proposed expanding its capacity up to 60 billion cubic metres (2.1 trillion cubic feet) by building a second line of the pipeline.^[8]

Economic impact

The first aim of the pipeline is to supply Turkey and Georgia. As a transit country, Georgia has rights to take 5% of the annual gas flow through the pipeline in lieu of a tariff and can purchase a further 0.5 billion cubic metres (18 billion cubic feet) of gas a year at a discounted price. It supplies Europe with Caspian natural gas through the Southern Gas Corridor pipelines, through the Trans Adriatic Pipeline and Trans-Anatolian gas pipeline.^[7]

Project company

The pipeline is owned by the South Caucasus Pipeline Company, a consortium led by BP. As of 2022, the shareholders of the consortium are:^[6]

BP (UK) 29.99%
Lukoil (Russia) 19.99%
TPAO (Turkey) 19.00%^[7]
SOCAR (Azerbaijan) 14.35%
NICO (Iran) 10.00%
SGC Upstream (Azerbaijan) 6.67%

The technical operator of the pipeline is BP and the commercial operator was Statoil. According to the PSA agreement, the commercial operatorship of the SCP was transferred to SOCAR starting on 1 January 2015.

South Caucasus Pipeline expansion (SCPx)

As a part of the Shah Deniz Full Field Development (FFD), otherwise called the Shahdeniz-2 project, BP will expand the pipeline through capacity extension by putting two additional compressor stations in Georgia and Turkey. This will almost triple the current transportation capacity of the pipeline up to 20 bcm/year.^[9]

This capacity increase would be able to accommodate an additional 16 bcm gas coming from the SD-2 project.

The SCPX follows the line of the earlier BTC and SCP pipelines across Azerbaijan. The project included an archaeological programme and supplemented the discoveries of the earlier two projects.^[10]^[11]

Footnotes

^ ^a ^b "SCP Commissioning Commences" (Press release). BP. 2006-06-01. Archived from the original on May 5, 2010. Retrieved 2008-04-06.
^ "Azerbaijan's Shah Deniz Field On Stream". OilVoice. 2006-12-15. Archived from the original on Nov 20, 2008. Retrieved 2006-12-18.
^ "BP shuts in Georgia links". Upstream Online. NHST Media Group. 2008-08-12. Archived from the original on Aug 22, 2008. Retrieved 2008-08-13.
^ "BP turns on Georgia gas taps". Upstream Online. NHST Media Group. 2008-08-14. Archived from the original on Aug 30, 2008. Retrieved 2008-08-14.
^ "Shah Deniz taps primed". Upstream Online. NHST Media Group. 2006-09-14. Archived from the original on May 15, 2009. Retrieved 2008-04-06.
^ ^a ^b "South Caucasus Pipeline (SCP)". SGC. Retrieved 2022-10-22.
^ ^a ^b ^c Socor, Vladimir (15 January 2014). "SCP, TANAP, TAP: Segments of the Southern Gas Corridor to Europe". Eurasia Daily Monitor. Vol. 11, no. 8. The Heritage Foundation. Retrieved 18 January 2014.
^ Socor, Vladimir (2012-09-11). "Azerbaijan Drives the Planning on Trans-Anatolia Gas Pipeline Project". Eurasia Daily Monitor. Vol. 9, no. 164. Jamestown Foundation. Retrieved 2012-09-12.
^ "Home".
^ Maynard, David (2023). "Archaeological Excavations on the SCPX Pipeline, Azerbaijan 2013-2018". Internet Archaeology (59). doi:10.11141/ia.59.11.
^ Maynard, David; Taylor, Paul Michael (2011). "Archaeological Excavations on the BTC Pipeline, Azerbaijan". Internet Archaeology (29). doi:10.11141/ia.29.1.

References

International Energy Agency: Caspian oil and gas: The supply potential of Central Asia and Transcaucasia. OECD, Paris 1998, ISBN 92-64-16095-7
Charles van der Leeuw: Oil and gas in the Caucasus & Caspian: A history. Curzon, Richmond, Surrey 2000, ISBN 0-7007-1123-6
John Roberts: Caspian oil and gas: How far have we come and where are we going? In: Oil, transition and security in Central Asia. RoutledgeCurzon, London [u.a.] 2003, ISBN 0-415-31090-3