Baku Eyes End of Russian Gas Imports
Azerbaijan expects to produce 24.732bn m³ of sales gas next year, marking an increase of 12.8% on this year. According to the 2019 draft budget submitted to parliament, it also estimates sales gas output to reach 21.92bn m³ this year, some 15.6% more than last year.
Most of next year's growth is expected to come from increasing the capacity of Shah Deniz stage 1, together with the inauguration of the field’s second phase in late July. An official told NGW recently that Shah Deniz is expected to raise production by 1.8bn m3 this year and reach 12bn m3.
State-run firm, Socar, announced October 24 that given the rise in domestic production, Azerbaijan has no plans to continue importing Russian gas in 2019.
Gazprom and Socar signed a gas purchase contract November 1, 2017,to supply 1.6bn m3 to Azerbaijan, which began immediately. Last year the country's gas intake volume was 349mn m3 and for the first nine months of this year import volume reached 801mn m3. An additional 450mn m3 should be supplied in Q4.
The country’s total imports from both Russia and Turkmenistan rose 22.6% year-on-year to 1.59bn m3 for the first nine months of 2018, while its exports grew 5.8% to 6.48bn m3.