The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) Board of Directors (BoD) has endorsed a US$500m loan to finance the completion of the 16 bcm/year Trans-Anatolian Natural Gas Pipeline (TANAP), which runs through Turkey and is currently under construction. The facility will bring Azerbaijan's gas production from the Caspian Sea to the EU and fits into the framework of the Southern Gas Corridor (SGC), which also includes the South Caucasus Pipeline (SCP) and the Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP).
The 1,850 km-long TANAP gas pipeline project broke ground in March 2015 and will be commissioned in stages: the first phase, connecting the Shah Deniz II field in the Caspian Sea (Azerbaijan) to the Turkish transmission network is expected to be commissioned in mid-2018 with an initial capacity of 16 bcm/year; of this amount, 6 bcm/year will be sold in Turkey and the remaining 10 bcm/year will be transited to European markets. The capacity of the pipeline should rise to 23 bcm/year by 2023 and to 31 bcm/year in 2026, with 21 bcm/year for Turkey.
The TANAP will be operated by the Azerbaijan state-run company SOCAR, which currently holds a 58% stake in the project. The Turkish pipeline operator BOTAŞ owns 30%, while BP acquired 12% in the project in March 2015.
Source: FT Research