BAKU, Azerbaijan (AP) – Azerbaijan plans to double its oil output by 2010, the head of the state oil company said Wednesday.
Natiq Aliyev, the head of the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR) said that the Caspian nation’s crude production, which stood at 32.3 million tons last year, would reach 65 million tons in 2010.
Aliyev said most of the oil would be produced at Azeri-Chiraq-Guneshli fields which will also account for the bulk of the nation’s natural gas ouput expected to reach 30 billion cubic meters in 2010.
Crude supplies began last year via the $4 billion Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline that allows the West to tap oil from the Caspian Sea fields, estimated to hold the world’s third-largest reserves, bypassing Russia and Iran.
Washington staunchly supported the 1,768-kilometer (1,100-mile) pipeline as part of a strategy to tap sources of crude outside of the Middle East and draw the Caspian states away from Russia and closer to the West. A prospective natural gas pipeline is also being considered.
Aliyev said that Azerbaijan would eventually control marketing and sales of gas from the Shah Deniz field.
“Norway’s Statoil has served as the operator of Azerbaijan Gas Supply Company in the first stage of the Shah Deniz development, but the situation will change,” he said at a news conference. “Azerbaijan itself will conduct all talks on gas supplies to the European markets.”
