Page 68 - GEORptOct22

interest," the military department said in a statement.
According to the Ministry of Defence, it was stated at the meeting that "Azerbaijani-Georgian relations are based on friendship and mutual trust, and regular meetings of the heads of state contribute to the further strengthening of bilateral cooperation." It was emphasised that "these relations, which meet mutual interests, serve to ensure peace, stability and security in the region". According to analyst Fuad Shahbazov, Azerbaijan wants to increase military cooperation with Georgia and has especially taken an interest in Sachkhere Mountain Training School, a mountain warfare training facility in Georgia, located near the town of Sachkhere in the west of the country.
9.2 Major corporate news 9.2.1 Oil & gas corporate news
BP suspends oil exports via the Baku-Supsa pipeline
Azerbaijan’s gas deliveries via TAP reach 33 mcm per day
The consortium operating the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli (ACG) megastructure in the Caspian Sea led by British oil giant BP has suspended oil shipments from Sangachal to a Georgian port on the Black Sea along the Baku-Supsa route, according to BP Azerbaijan.
According to BP, the last time oil was exported via this route was in April. At that time, oil was transported from the port of Supsa by two tankers belonging to BP and the State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR).
All oil produced by the consortium at ACG is likely to be sent via the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline. According to traders, deliveries along the Baku-Supsa route were suspended due to the 'complexity of logistics in the Black Sea', hinting at possible Russian intervention in oil delivery.
The BTC oil export pipeline has achieved the milestone of 500mn tonnes of oil in total from the Sangachal terminal near Baku across Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey to Ceyhan. The milestone was achieved on 12 December when the 500 millionth tonne of Caspian crude flowed through the pipeline, according to a statement released by BP.
The gas capacity of the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) could be increased to 12bn cubic metres (bcm) per year without the building of a new pipe, said Luca Schieppati, managing director of pipeline company TAP AG, during a speech carried by Sky TG24.
“Over the past three days, TAP has been operating at maximum capacity, transporting 33 million cubic metres [mcm] of gas per day [following March during which it carried 28 mcm per day]. In annual terms, this corresponds to an accumulation of 12 bcm, of which 10.5 bcm can end up delivered to Italy. (...) To increase the volume of gas supplies via TAP, there is no need to use another pipe, we only need to increase the compression in Greece and Albania,” he said.
Schieppati also noted that the long-term goal was to double the capacity of the pipeline. “From this point of view, the support of the European Commission and the Italian government is important,” Shippati said. “Gas pipelines such as TAP now serve to enhance energy security and will continue to serve in the future due to the ability to transport hydrogen mixed with gas over the same infrastructure,” he added.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) predicts that gas exports from Azerbaijan to Europe via TAP in 2022 will reach the projected 10 bcm. Earlier, TAP AG reported that the volume of Azerbaijani gas exported to Europe via TAP from December 31, 2020 to December 31, 2021 amounted to 8.1 bcm. Of this volume, over 6.8 bcm were delivered to Italy, and around 1.2 bcm to
68 GEORGIA Country Report October 2022 www.intellinews.com