Cost of Baku-Ceyhan Pipeline 30 percent Higher (26/04/2006)

Τετ, 26 Απριλίου 2006 - 12:02
The cost of the Baku-Ceyhan oil pipeline has risen to $3.9 billion, 30 percent above the original estimate of $2.95 billion, the head of BP Plc in Azerbaijan said last week. David Woodward told reporters that the expense of contractors and building materials had forced up the cost of the pipeline, which BP is leading. “This price does not take into account the cost of filling the pipeline with oil and cost of borrowing to realize the project,” he said. The cost of filling the 1,768-kilometer (1,099-mile) pipeline with 10 million barrels of oil has also grown, because of rising world prices, and is expected to be around $600 million. Woodward said the first tanker of Azeri oil could leave Ceyhan, on the Turkish Mediterranean coast, at the end of spring, although the official launch of the pipeline is due by the end of the second quarter of the year.