State Oil Company of the Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR) has announced the start of the transit of Kazakh oil through the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline.
The first shipment of Kazakh oil from the Tengiz field arrived at the Sangachal Terminal in Azerbaijan from the port of Aktau via the “President Heydar Aliyev” tanker on March 23.
The transportation of Kazakh oil through BTC is being carried out under a Master Agreement between SOCAR and KazMunayGas, which aims to transit 1.5 million tons of oil annually.
There are plans to conduct 14 tanker voyages per month across the Caspian Sea until the end of 2023. The second loading of Kazakh oil from the port of Aktau will be done via the “Shusha” tanker on March 27.
Kazakh oil is transited via the BTC as part of an agreement between SOCAR and Kazakh KazMunayGas, which envisages transiting 1.5 million tonnes of oil per year.
In 2022, SOCAR executed significant projects to upgrade the gathering pipeline network at the Sangachal Terminal to receive Kazakh oil into the BTC pipeline, increasing its capacity utilization.
