The Trans Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP) will be completed
ahead of scheduled date, if all goes as planned, Turkey's Energy and
Natural Resources Minister Berat Albayrak said during his visit on
Thursday to the Dardanelles (Canakkale) Strait where the sub-sea section
of the pipeline project is being laid.
Albayrak said that 80
percent of the project is now completed, adding, "today we have seen
that 1,261 pipes were connected, which is a truly significant number,
thanks to all concerned for this success."
TANAP is a natural gas
pipeline, currently under construction and stretching from the
Turkey-Georgia border to the Turkey-Greece border to supply natural gas
both to Turkey and also to European countries.
The project will
start transporting natural gas from Azerbaijan to Turkey next year and
to Europe in the first quarter of 2020 via the Trans Adriatic Pipeline
(TAP), Albayrak informed.
TANAP's initial capacity per year will
be 16 billion cubic meters, out of which Turkey will utilize 6 billion
cubic meters while the remaining 10 billion cubic meters will be
delivered to Europe.
This project is very important for the energy
security of Turkey and Europe, Albayrak said during what he termed was
"one of the critical milestones of the projects" in the Dardanelles.
The
Malaysian energy company SapuraKencana was awarded the engineering
works for the construction and procurement of the sub-sea section of the
TANAP in July 2016.
TAP will transport natural gas from the giant
Shah Deniz II field in Azerbaijan to Europe. The approximately 878 km
long pipeline will connect with the Trans Anatolian Pipeline (TANAP) at
the Turkish-Greek border and the Adriatic Sea, before coming ashore in
Southern Italy.
The project's 17.6 kilometer-long sub-sea section
out of a total pipeline length of 1,850 kilometers will pass through the
Dardanelles.
(Anadolu Agency)