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Baku-Ceyhan second cargo expected around June 20

06 June 2006 [13:34] - TODAY.AZ
The second cargo from the BP-led Baku-Ceyhan oil pipeline will load around June 20 but the flow of oil will then be interrupted for 10 days for last-minute work on the terminal and the pipeline, a BP official said on Tuesday.

According to Reuters, David Woodward, the head of BP Azerbaijan, said there was already enough oil in the storage tanks in the Turkish Mediterranean port of Ceyhan to load another cargo of Azeri Light crude , although he did not specify the size.

The third cargo will go to BP and will load on July 13, the day of the official launch of the pipeline, Woodward said.

The first cargo of Azeri crude loaded at Ceyhan on Sunday. It was bought by Exxon, which shipped it to the Italian port of Savona, where it was sold to a Korean buyer, an official from Azeri state oil firm SOCAR said.

The long-delayed start of the $4 billion pipeline from Azerbaijan is crucially important for the landlocked Caspian Sea as it will allow crude from the region to bypass Russian pipelines and the congested Turkish straits for the first time.

BP expects the pipeline to carry 300,000 barrels of oil per day later this year, rising to its full capacity of 1 million bpd in 2008.

Most of the oil for the pipeline is expected to come from a BP-led group producing in the Caspian Sea Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli oilfields. The group produced 389,000 bpd in April and expects to reach 1 million bpd by the end of the decade.

Woodward said that the start of the pipeline would allow the BP-led group to stop using other routes to take its oil from the Caspian to the Black Sea, namely the Baku-Novorossiisk and Baku-Supsa pipelines and the rail link to Batumi.

He said that the increased flows of Azeri Light into the Mediterranean from Ceyhan could lead to West African cargoes being pushed out and left to find a market elsewhere, such as in the United States.

An official from SOCAR said the Azeri state oil company would also cut its exports via the Novorossiisk to 1.5 million tonnes next year from around 2.5 million tonnes this year.

The firm may send the remaining 1 million tonnes through the new pipeline, although he said the fees were still high, and a final decision would depend on market conditions at the time.

He also said SOCAR was hoping to start selling crude directly to refineries later this year, rather than selling via tenders, and it was in talks to set up an office in London.

/www.reuters.com/

URL: http://www.today.az/news/business/26957.html

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