Ankara (dpa) – Turkey and Azerbaijan plan to build a pipeline to Europe that will carry 16 billion cubic meters of natural gas a year, officials of the two states said Monday. The Trans-Anatolian pipeline could cost 5 billion dollars, Turkish Energy Minister Taner Yildiz told reporters at the agreement's signing ceremony in the Turkish capital, Turkey's NTV channel reported. The pipeline, which will take five years to build, will run from Azerbaijan's Shah Deniz 2 field in the Caspian Sea to Turkey's European borders. Of the pipeline's capacity of 16 billion cubic meters, about 6 billion cubic meters of natural gas is expected to be consumed in Turkey, leaving 10 billion cubic meters for European customers. The Azerbaijani industry and energy minister, Natiq Aliyev, said that with this project, “we will get into the European market together.” The founding consortium consists of Azerbaijan's state energy company SOCAR, Turkey's national pipeline company BOTAŞ and the Turkish petroleum corporation TPAO. But others will be invited to join the consortium later, the semi-official Anatolian Agency reported. Ankara has also signed an agreement to build the Nabucco pipeline that would carry Caspian and Middle Eastern natural gas across Turkey and Bulgaria to Austria. Nabucco, which is seen as reducing Europe's dependency on Russian natural gas, has been plagued by doubts over whether it can secure enough suppliers to meet its capacity of 30 billion cubic meters per year. Yildiz said the Trans-Anatolian could in theory feed natural gas into Nabucco at Turkey's Bulgarian border. BM ShortURL: http://goo.gl/frJKj Tags: Azerbaijan, Gas Pipeline, Turkey Section: Business
