In January 2013 675,000 barrels of oil a day produced on Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli field

During January 2013 20,900,000 barrels or 2,824,300 tons of oil was extracted on the contract area Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli (ACG), sources from the government told Turan.

The same source told Turan that in January 2013 the international consortium produced in average about 675,000 barrels of oil a day and this was close to the volume produced in December 2012. He said the January ACG showings exceeded average production in quarter 4, 2012. “However, this has happened purely on technical reasons, because in October 2012 the Deep-water Guneshli platform has been standing idle for almost three weeks, because of the upgrade of the underwater infrastructure,” said the same source.

The production on the ACG contract area declined against January 2012. According to the BP-Azerbaijan company’s report, during quarter 1, 2012 711,800 barrels of oil a day was produced on the ACG. Considering that this is quarterly data and production kept declining, one can suppose that in January 2012 the international consortium produced about 720,000 barrels of oil a day.

The oil production in early years against the same period last year is natural. At present the consortium has been drilling new operation wells to prevent production decline, but results of these works will be noticeable only in the middle of the year.

According to preliminary information, in 2012 ACG produced 33 million tons of oil, down 2.46 million tons against 2011.—0—