DEC. 21 2010 (The Conway Bulletin) – Construction started on an extension in west Kazakhstan of a gas pipeline that runs from Central Asia to China. When completed in 2015, the 1,475km pipeline will run from Beineu near the Caspian Sea to Shymkent on the border with Uzbekistan and link up with an existing pipeline to China.
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(News report from Issue No. 21, published on Jan. 4 2011)
DEC. 20 2010 (The Conway Bulletin) – Iran wants to boost gas imports from Azerbaijan in 2011, the Iranian news agency SHANA quoted a senior official at the Iranian National Gas Company (INGC) as saying. Iran has improved ties with its neighbours in Central Asia and the South Caucasus this year especially with Azerbaijan.
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(News report from Issue No. 20, published on Dec. 20 2010)
DEC. 14 2010 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazmunaigas Exploration & Production (KMG EP) said it will increase spending by 15% in 2011 to $661m. The number of production drills KMG EP operates will increase to 239 from 213 and its exploration budget will double to $55m. KMG EP is traded in London. Kazmunaigas holds the controlling stake.
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(News report from Issue No. 20, published on Dec. 20 2010)
DEC. 12 2010 (The Conway Bulletin) — It is still a long way off, but Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India took a determined step forward on Dec. 11, 2010 to turning a 15-year-old pipe dream into reality.
The four countries finally signed an accord which binds them to building a 1,700km gas pipeline from the Dauletabad gas field in southeast Turkmenistan across Afghanistan and Pakistan to Fazilka, an Indian border town. It has been talked about since 1995 but war in Afghanistan and a lack of political will delayed the project.
Now, they want the so-called TAPI pipeline operating by 2014 even though the route goes through Taliban controlled parts of Afghanistan. Estimates put the cost of the pipeline, which will have a capacity of 33b cubic metres a year, at between $3.3b and $7.5b.
For the US, the pipeline is important because it acts as an alternative to a proposed pipeline running to Pakistan and India from Iran.
TAPI has gained momentum, largely because India has pushed to increase its energy import options and because of a leadership change in Turkmenistan. Turkmenistan’s leader Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, president since Dec. 21 2006, has been eagerly courting Western, Chinese and Iranian investors since an argument over gas prices with Russia in 2009.
Turkmenistan, which holds the world’s fourth largest gas reserves, has a growing list of clients and an expanding web of pipelines feeding these customers directly with its gas. If TAPI goes to plan, Turkmenistan is set to become an important energy supplier to South Asia.
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(News report from Issue No. 19, published on Dec. 13 2010)
DEC. 11 2010 (The Conway Bulletin) — The leaders of Turkmenistan, Afghanistan and Pakistan and the Indian energy minister struck a deal in Ashgabat to build a pipeline carrying Turkmen gas 1,700km across Taliban-held territory to India. The cost and timing of the so-called TAPI pipeline have yet to be agreed.
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(News report from Issue No. 19, published on Dec. 13 2010)
NOV. 28 2010 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkmen leader Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad officially opened the final half of a 1,000km pipeline pumping gas from Turkmenistan to Iran. The pipeline doubles annual Turkmen gas exports to Iran to 20b cubic metres.
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(News report from Issue No. 17, published on Nov. 29 2010)
NOV. 23/24 2010 (The Conway Bulletin) – Uzbekistan’s President Islam Karimov flew to Qatar and signed bilateral agreements promising closer ties between the energy producing nations. This was Karimov’s first trip to Qatar. He has previously spoken about increasing cooperation
with energy producers in the Middle East.
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(News report from Issue No. 17, published on Nov. 29 2010)
NOV. 22 2010 (The Conway Bulletin) – Control of the Caspian Sea and its resources are worth arguing over.
It is the biggest inland body of water in the world, covering an area about the size of Germany, and dominates trade routes between Europe and Asia. The Caspian Sea also holds vast stocks of sturgeon which produce the lucrative caviar. Most tantalising, though, is the oil potential.
Its reserves are difficult to estimate but the US Energy Information Administration puts them at between 17b and 44b barrels of oil — equivalent to the oil reserves of Qatar at the bottom end of the scale and to the United States at the upper end.
The five states which border the Caspian Sea — Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Russia and Turkmenistan — have argued over its ownership for years. On Nov. 18 in Baku the heads of these countries met for their third summit in eight years on how to divide the Caspian Sea and its treasures between them. Once again much was promised but little agreed.
Writing for Asia Times Online, Robert Cutler, a Canada-based academic, commented: “While the framework for a relatively minor security cooperation agreement was endorsed, the summit’s real significance lay in the agreements not reached and documents not signed.”
Before 1991, ownership of the Caspian Sea was less complex as it only needed an agreement between the Soviet Union and Iran. Now, with five countries, it’s far more difficult. Add into the mix the Caspian Sea’s emergence as an energy transit route to Europe and the debates heat up.
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(News report from Issue No. 16, published on Nov. 22 2010)
NOV. 18 2010 (The Conway Bulletin) – The leaders of the five countries that border the Caspian Sea met for a summit in Baku to discuss the sea’s disputed ownership but they failed to sign any major agreements. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had arrived on Nov.17 for separate bilateral talks with Azerbaijan’s President.
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(News report from Issue No. 16, published on Nov. 22 2010)
NOV. 19 2010 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkmenistan has won the support of neighbouring countries to build a gas pipeline under the Caspian Sea, said deputy PM Baymyrad Khozhamuhamedov. He also said Turkmenistan would be able to supply the EU-backed Nabucco pipeline project with gas.
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(News report from Issue No. 16, published on Nov. 22 2010)
