Azerbaijan's Gas Production Slips

Azerbaijan’s gas production reached 29.1bn m³ in 2015, down 1.6% on 2014, according to an article written by energy minister Natig Aliev and published January 15 in official paper Azerbaycan.

Of that, 12.3bn m³ were associated gas from the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli block and 9.9bn m³ came from the Shah Deniz field. UK major BP is the operator of both. Another 6.9bn m³ were produced by Socar and its subsidiaries. The international consortium operating ACG last year delivered 3.1bn m³ of associated gas free of charge to the Azeri buyer at the beach terminal, according to the production-sharing agreement.

The production figure shown however is the total amount, which means that last year 9.2bn m³ of gas were injected into the oil reservoir to maintain pressure at ACG, meaning oil production is becoming harder. It has fallen by a quarter since 2010, from 42mn metric tons to 31mn mt in 2015.

The minister said that gas production from Shah Deniz this year will be at 10.1bn m³. The state company is expecting a drop in its production this year to 6.3bn m³.

Forecast gas production from ACG is 12.085bn m³, the minister said and of that, the state company is expecting to receive 1bn m³ less this year than last, or just 2.055bn m³.