|
BP SAYS 4bn DOLLARS SPENT ON MAJOR AZERI
OIL PROJECT
Excerpt from report by Azerbaijani news agency Media-Press
Baku, 9 August: Since 2001, 4bn dollars have been spent on
construction within the Azari project - the full-scale development
of the Azari-Ciraq-Gunasli (ACG) offshore oil fields, BP Azerbaijan
Vice-President Neil Shaw has reported.
On the Central Azari oil field, 97 per cent of the work has
been completed, Shaw said. On the East Azari, 31 per cent
of the work has been accomplished (against the scheduled 26
per cent), and on the West Azari 63 per cent (against 61 per
cent). Some 9,500 Azerbaijani citizens are employed in the
Azari project.
Construction for the first phase of the ACG development project
is ahead of schedule, Shaw said.
Phase One was sanctioned on 20 August 2001. It envisages
the development of the central part of the Azari field by
installing there the Central Azari extraction platform with
48 boreholes. In all, 193m t of oil (1.245bn
barrels) will be produced during Phase One. The extraction
will peak at 18.7m t per year (375,000 barrels a day). The
cost of Phase One is 3.4bn dollars.
For the full development of the Azari field, two platforms
- each with 48 boreholes - will be installed in the eastern
and western parts of the field. These platforms are built
for Phase Two of the project, which was sanctioned on 18 September
2002. First oil from these platforms will be produced in the
second quarter of 2006 and the first quarter of 2007 respectively.
This will raise the output by more than 20m t per year (420,000
barrels per day). The cost of Phase Two is 5.2bn dollars.
[Passage omitted: List of companies involved in the project]
Source: Media-Press news agency, Baku, in Russian 0958 gmt
9 Aug 04
BBC Mon TCU 100804 sa/ra
|
