The European Union has urged Azerbaijan to double the capacity of the planned Trans-Anatolia natural gas pipeline (Tanap) to 20 billion cubic meters a year, Spiegel reported.
The European Commission’s vice president for energy union, Maros Sefcovic, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and Turkish Energy Minister Taner Yildiz have agreed to increase the pipeline’s capacity, Spiegel said.
The agreement came in response to Russia’s decision to scrap the South Stream gas pipeline to Europe.
Azerbaijan’s state oil company SOCAR, which holds 70 percent of Tanap, could not immediately be reached for comment.
The 2,000-km pipeline is to deliver 10 billion cubic meters of gas a year to the EU from 2019.
Construction is scheduled to start next year and be completed in 2018 at an estimated cost of $11.3 billion.
Turkey’s state pipeline company BOTAS holds the remaining 30 percent of Tanap.
BP is expected to buy 12 percent equity in the pipeline by the end of the year.
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