Shah Deniz gas field

Shah Deniz gas field is the largest natural gas field in Azerbaijan. It is situated in the South Caspian Sea, off the coast of Azerbaijan, approximately southeast of Baku, at a depth of . The field covers approximately . The Shah Deniz gas and condensate field was discovered in 1999. It is to bring gas into Europe without having to traverse countries like Russia or Iran, deemed to be politically unreliable by some in order to promote their projected Nabucco pipeline.

Ownership

The Shah Deniz field is operated by BP which has a share of 25.5%. Other partners include Statoil (25.5%), SOCAR (10%), Total S.A. (10%), LukAgip, a joint company of Eni and LUKoil (10%), NIOC (10%), and TPAO (9%).

Reserves

The Shah Deniz reserves are estimates to be between to of oil equivalent from 50 to 100 billion cubic meters of gas. Gas production to date at the end of 2005 was estimated to be approximately 7 billion cubic meters (600 mmcf/day avg). The Shah Deniz field also contains gas condensate in excess of 400 million cubic meters.

Pipeline

The South Caucasus Pipeline, which began operation at the end of 2006, transports gas from the Shah Deniz field in the Azerbaijan sector of the Caspian Sea to Turkey, through Georgia.

The associated condensate is mixed with the oil from the ACG field and is transported to Turkey through Georgia, along the Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan pipeline.

Recent developments

The Shah Deniz scheme started to produce gas at...
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