Azerbaijan considers possibility of fuel oil import

Source from the oil market of the country told Turan that Azerbaijan considers beginning of fuel oil import.

The same source said that it is planned to buy black oil at the regional markets. ”The price of fuel oil at the world markets now is about $120 per 1 ton, but at the regional markets, especially Russia and Turkmenistan, price of this oil product is much cheaper,” said the same source.

Since August 2015 Azerbaijan started partially using black oil as fuel at its thermal power stations. Before that since 2001 Azerbaijan always used natural gas to generate power. However, in August 2015 production on the Shah Deniz gas condensate field was suspended for almost a month, because of the planned repair works on the production platform. Then SOCAR used gas to fill the underground storages.

According to the official statistics, last year over 315,000 tons of fuel oil was delivered to the power companies.

On December 1, 2015 the Tariff Council (state regulator) reduced fuel oil price for SOCAR by three times and fixed the price at 100 AZN per 1 ton.

At the IP Week conference in London last week Rovnag Abdullayev, President of State Oil Company of Azerbaijan (SOCAR), told journalists: “Many of our power stations are running on black oil, which is much cheaper, than gas now.”—0—