Tag Archives: hydrocarbons

Energy ministers agree to build hydropower plant in Kyrgyzstan

JAN. 6 2023 (The Bulletin) — The energy ministers of Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan signed a deal to develop a major hydropower station in Kyrgyzstan which they hope will help to ease pressure on the region’s power production capacity. Plans to build Kambarata HPP-1 in Kyrgyzstan’s Jalalabad region have been on the drawing board for years and signing the deal is considered a major regional diplomatic success. Construction is scheduled to take up to 10 years. Central Asia’s power grid systems are interconnected.

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— This story was published in issue 532 of the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin, on Jan. 16 2023

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Azerbjainan’s energy fund SOFAz denies it plans to buy Latvian gas firm

JAN. 5 2023 (The Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s energy wealth fund SOFAZ was forced to deny that it intended to buy Latvia’s biggest gas trading company Lavija Gaze after some news agencies reported that it would shortly become the biggest shareholder. SOFAZ’s cash pile has been swelled by huge inflows from oil and gas sales this year and analysts have said that it is looking to buy assets, especially in Europe.

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— This story was published in issue 532 of the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin, on Jan. 16 2023

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Turkmen foreign minister flies to Kabul for Taliban meeting

OCT. 27 2021 (The Bulletin) — Turkmen officials were preparing to fly to Kabul after the Taliban government said that it supported its moves to build a gas pipeline, dubbed TAPI, across the country.

The project is important to Turkmen leader Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov because he wants to diversify Turkmenistan’s gas clients away from an over-reliance on China. The Western-backed government in Afghanistan had supported the TAPI plans but there were some concerns that the Taliban, which took control of Afghanistan in August, might ditch it. 

Turkmen officials, though, have taken a comparatively soft line towards the Taliban since they took power, opening up lines of communications and sending aid. Now, it seems, the Taliban have decided to back TAPI.

In a statement, the acting Taliban minister for mines and petroleum, Mohammed Issa Akhund, said that the project would now go ahead, although he didn’t give dates.

“We have been working hard for some time and we are ready to take pride in starting work on the TAPI project,” he said.

The pipeline is slated to carry 33b cubic metres of gas across Afghanistan to Pakistan and India from Turkmenistan’s giant Galkynysh field once it is completed, an ambitious plan by Turkmenistan to turn itself into the region’s main gas exporter. 

Under the current plans, Afghanistan would keep about 5% of the gas supplies and also earn hundreds of millions of dollars in transit fees.

Separately, the Taliban government also said that it will pay Uzbekistan millions of dollars in fees it owes for electricity purchases. Like Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan has looked to engage with the Taliban government in Afghanistan since it took control of the country, hosting its officials in Termez and sending envoys to Kabul.

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— This story was published in issue 505 of the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin, on Oct. 28 2021

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Kazakhstan agrees deal with OPEC to increase oil production

JULY 19 2021 (The Bulletin) — Kazakhstan said that it had agreed a deal with OPEC to allow it to increase its oil production quota from August. Although not part of OPEC, Kazakhstan, with Russia and Azerbaijan, had agreed to go along with oil output cuts that OPEC set early in 2020 to try to push up depressed oil prices. From August, Kazakhstan will produce 1.491m barrels of oil per day, up by 16,000 barrels. This is still below its benchmark November 2018 levels.

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— This story was published in issue 493 of the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin, on July 22 2021

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Uzbekneftegaz to launch gas-to-liquid plant this year

JUNE 11 2021 (The Bulletin) — Uzbekneftegaz said that it would launch its first gas-to-liquids plant in Q4 2021. Opening the plant in the south of the country will reduce Uzbekistan’s reliance on imports of diesel and jet fuel. Uzbekneftegaz has been building the $3.6b plant since 2019. It was supposed to start operations in 2020 but the coronavirus pandemic and strikes over pay and conditions have delayed the construction.

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— This story was published in issue 48 of the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin, on June 16 2021

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Kashagan to start work on building gas processing plant

JUNE 8 2021 (The Bulletin) — Kazakh PM Askar Mamin inaugurated the construction of a gas processing plant at an onshore plant linked to the Kashagan oil project. The Kashagan oil field is in the Caspian Sea but it pumps oil and gas to an onshore processing site. The gas processing plant will start production from the end of 2023 and will have a capacity of 1m cubic metres of gas per year.

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— This story was published in issue 487 of the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin, on June 9 2021

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Lukoil expects to be named Dostluk operator

JUNE 3 2021 (The Bulletin) — Lukoil expects to be named as the operator of the Caspian Sea’s Dostluk oil field which Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan said earlier this year that they want to exploit, the TASS news agency quoted Lukoil chairman Vagit Alekperov as saying. Dostluk sits midway between Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan and had been the focus of a long-running row between the two countries.

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— This story was published in issue 487 of the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin, on June 9 2021

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BP walks away from three oil projects in Kazakhstan’s Caspian Sea

ALMATY/MARCH 11 (The Bulletin) — Britain’s BP has walked away from three oil and gas projects in the Kazakh sector of the Caspian Sea, saying that it wanted to focus on developing its renewable energy portfolio instead, Kazakhstan’s state-owned Kazmunaigas said (March 11).

BP’s decision to ditch potential projects in the Caspian Sea with Kazmunaigas, which it explained in a letter in October last year, will concern Kazakh officials who still see exploiting oil and gas potential as the quickest and most certain way of pushing economic development forward.

Kazmunaigas said that it was publishing BP’s letter on its website in response to media speculation on why progress on the three hydrocarbon blocks has stalled.

“The decision is related to a revision of the company’s strategy — BP intends to focus its activities on renewable energy sources,” Kazmunaigas wrote.

For the 18 months up to October 2020, BP had been evaluating the potential for developing the Bolshoy Zhambyl, Zhemchuzhnaya and Kalamkas Sea offshore blocks, located near the Karachaganak oil field. Karachaganak is Kazakhstan’s largest post-Soviet oil discovery but it has been beset by cost overruns and production problems.

BP’s exit from the Kazakh sector of the Caspian Sea follows a decision by Royal Dutch Shell in 2019 to also quit two oil projects because the costs were too high.

During the coronavirus pandemic, oil prices plunged and last year BP said that it wanted to restructure its portfolio and cuts its hydrocarbon base by 40% over the next decade.

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— This story was published in issue 475 of the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin, on March 15 2021

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Azerbaijan’s daily oil production will increase -EIA

MARCH 11 (The Bulletin) — The US Energy Information Agency (EIA) increased its forecast for Azerbaijan’s oil production to 770,000 barrels per day (bpd) in 2021, up 40,000bpd from an earlier forecast. The increase is linked to a relaxation of oil production limits that the Saudi-led oil cartel OPEC and its FSU supporters, Russia, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan, introduced last month. Limits had been imposed to push up oil prices. In 2020, during the oil production limits, Azerbaijan had produced 710,000bpd. Oil revenues form the backbone of Azerbaijan’s economy.

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— This story was published in issue 475 of the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin, on March 15 2021

— Copyright the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin 2021

OPEC agrees to allow Kazakhstan to increase its oil production quota

MARCH 5 2021 (The Bulletin) — OPEC, the Saudi Arabia-dominated oil exporting group agreed to allow Kazakhstan to raise its output. OPEC members had cut production to boost oil prices. Now that prices have increased, Brent crude is at around $69/barrel — its highest since the end of 2019, OPEC has loosened restrictions. Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, along with Russia, are not OPEC members but had gone along with the cuts. From April, Kazakhstan can boost its output by 20,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd), up from its current level of 1,437,000bpd. Azerbaijan, though, has agreed to maintain its output at 595,000 bpd.

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— This story was published in issue 474 of the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin, on March 5 2021

— Copyright the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin 2021