Page 9 - MEOG Week 29

MEOG Pi P e L ines & t rans P ort MEOG

Brooge close to finishing studies

for Fujairah storage expansion

uae uAE storage operator Brooge Energy is near to in revenues last year and is expected to perform
completing early technical studies for a phase- even more strongly in 2020, having secured a res-
three expansion of its facilities in Fujairah, it said ervation for all the capacity of its second-phase
on July 15. facilities, due to start up later this year.
The project includes the addition of an extra Brooge is currently in talks for contracts for
3.5mn cubic metres, or 22mn barrels, of oil stor- its third-phase facilities.
age space, and the construction of a 180,000 “We plan to ensure that Phase 3 capacity is
barrel per day (bpd) refinery. MuC Oil & Gas fully contracted through a multiyear take-or-
Engineering Consultancy (MuC) has issued the pay contract [before launching] construction to
final basic designs for the facilities, and a front- ensure revenue stability and visibility,” Paarden-
end engineering design (FEED) study should be kooper said.
ready in the coming weeks. Storage is in high demand as a result of coro-
“Once Phase 3 is completed, this would bring navirus (COVID-19) lockdowns, which caused
our total storage capacity up to 4.5mn cubic fuel demand to collapse and left producers una-
metres, which is the equivalent of 28.3mn bar- ble to cut supplies fast enough. This led to record
rels of oil, Brooge CEO Nicolaas Paardenkooper high storage levels across the world, and the
said. Fujairah port even reached full utilisation at one
Brooge is striving to become the largest point.
independent oil storage and service operator in Brooge signed a land lease agreement in Feb-
Fujairah, a major hub for both storage and bun- ruary with Fujairah Oil Industrial Zone for an
kering operations with a strategic location out- extra 450,000 square metres on land on which to
side the Strait of Hormuz. It enjoyed a 23% hike build the third-phase facilities.™

Azerbaijan warns of supply

risks following Armenia clashes

turkey ELSHAD Nassirov, vice president of Azeri state through Georgia, Turkey, Greece and Albania
energy company Socar, noted during a confer- and across the Adriatic Sea seabed.
ence call reported by Reuters that some of the “The pipeline will be ready and operational in
energy infrastructure involved in shipping Cas- time in October-November this year,” he report-
pian oil and gas to world markets is located in the edly said.
vicinity of the current military operations. Armenia on July 18 also warned about secu-
Fifteen servicemen from Azerbaijan and rity risks to the region after Azerbaijan said two
Armenia and one Azeri civilian died last week in days previously it might strike the Metsamor
clashes between the two countries. nuclear power plant.
Nassirov told the call that if they looked at “This is a statement that should be unequiv-
a map they would see that clashes had taken ocally considered a crime against humanity ...
place near some of its infrastructure. He said it should be given an appropriate international
the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline, the Baku- response and probe,” Armenian Prime Minister
Supsa oil pipeline, the Baku-Tbilisi-Erzrum gas Nikol Pashinyan said.
pipeline and some other facilities were located Nassirov spoke on a conference call organ-
not far from the territory where clashes had ised by uS-based think-tank the Caspian Policy
taken place. Center. He called on the West to help protect
Nassirov also mentioned the Trans-Adriatic Azerbaijan’s energy exports.
Pipeline (TAP), the last stretch of the South- “I would use this opportunity to invite our
ern Gas Corridor (SCG) set of interconnected colleagues in Washington and elsewhere to think
pipeline. The corridor, when operational, is set about how fragile ... this region is and to think
to reduce Europe’s dependence on Russian gas how to provide ... military and physical security
supplies with the provision of Azerbaijani gas to the corridor, which is providing energy secu-
from the Caspian Sea to Italy via a route running rity to Europe,” Nassirov said.™

Week 29 22•July•2020 www. NEWSBASE .com P9