Page 46 - GEORptAug20

9.0​ Industry & Sectors 9.1 ​Sector news
9.1.1 ​Oil & gas sector news
The Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) project—the last pipeline link required for Azerbaijan to meet its ambition of exporting natural gas to the European Union—has started introducing its first gas into the Albanian section of the pipeline, according to Azerbaijani media reports.
A four-kilometre pipeline section running from the Albanian-Greek border and the TAP metering station in Bilisht, southeastern Albania, received the gas on May 20, according to Azertac.
The €4.5bn project will enable gas flows to reach southern Italy via a route that stretches from the Turkish border, across Greece and Albania and the Adriatic Sea.
Prior to that, gas from Azerbaijan's Shah Deniz II development in the Caspian Sea is to flow through Southern Gas Corridor (SCG) pipelines to Turkey via Georgia.
The latest project update from TAP is that gas from Azerbaijan should reach Italy via its pipeline before the end of this year.
TAP’s shareholders are BP (20%), Socar (20%), Snam (20 %), Fluxys (19%), Enagas (16%) and Axpo (5%).
The state-owned Georgian Oil and Gas Corporation (GOGC) has announced​t​he termination by Georgia's State Oil and Gas Agency of its 1997 oil production sharing agreement with Texas-based oil company Frontera.​The move follows the upholding by an international arbitration tribunal of the vast majority of claims filed by the Georgian state against the US firm.
Frontera in​​a press release​quoted by Business Media has said that Georgia is making misleading statements in relation to the arbitration’s outcome. “Frontera is pleased with the decision of the Arbitration Court,” Frontera said, without providing substantial information about the actual decision of the tribunal.
Georgia had accused Frontera of violating the terms of the contract signed in 1997. Specifically, it claimed that Frontera refused to return to the state land it was no longer using for extraction. No request for the exploitation of an allegedly huge amount of discovered gas was filed, either, it said.
GOGC indicated that the State Oil and Gas Agency had sent it a notice as regards the termination of the contract with Frontera, and that the contract would be automatically considered as terminated on July 27.
"On April 17, 2020, the final arbitration decision was issued between the parties, on the one hand, Georgian Oil and Gas Corporation and State Agency of Oil and Gas (Georgia), on the other hand, Frontera Resources Georgia Corporation and Frontera US (Frontera) upon non-fulfilment of contractual obligations of the production sharing agreement and refinery study dated 25 June 1997,” the Georgian company said.
“The Arbitration Tribunal supported the interpretation of the norms of the contract by Georgia and satisfied a vast majority of its claims. Along with other issues, The Arbitration Tribunal ruled that Frontera committed a material breach of the contract by refusing to return the exploration area (99% of the
46​ GEORGIA Country Report ​August 2020 ​ ​www.intellinews.com