The volume of Azerbaijan’s gas exports increased by 16.9 percent to 13.8 billion cubic meters in 2020, Energy Minister Parviz Shahbazov said during the government session to sum up the results of 2020.
Shahbazov linked the increase in gas exports to the Southern Gas Corridor project. It should be noted that Azerbaijan started transportation of commercial gas transportation to Europe via the Trans Adriatic Pipeline for the first December 31 as part of the Southern Gas Corridor project.
The minister noted that currently 10.5 million cubic meters of gas are exported daily to Italy, 2 million cubic meters to Greece and 1 million cubic meters to Bulgaria.
In the meantime, it was noted that the country’s oil production decreased by 8.2 percent during the last year under OPEC+ agreement on the reduction of oil production.
Moreover, he stated that during the reported period, electricity exports totalled 1.1 billion kWh, underlining that work continues on creating and restoring electric power generating capacity.
“A total of 1,300 MW of capacity was restored under the relevant programs, and construction of the 385 MW power plant and the Goby substation continues. A new SCADA system is being built. Appropriate work is underway with foreign investment to build a new thermal power plant with a production capacity of up to 550 MW,”the minister stated.
Shahbazov emphasized that a draft strategy for the long-term development of the energy sector is being prepared in order to meet the goal of bringing the share of renewable energy in the installed capacity of electricity to 30 percent. As part of this framework, an agreement was signed with Saudi Arabia’s ACWA Power to build a wind farm with a capacity of 240 MW. It was noted that this project, based on foreign investment, will save 200 million cubic meters of gas per year.
