TIRANA (Albania), June 14 (SeeNews) – Azerbaijan’s state oil company SOCAR said it intends to prepare a feasibility study for the construction of a 40 km pipeline in Albania by the end of 2018, Baku-based news agency Trend reported on Thursday.
SOCAR, via its subsidiary SOCAR Balkan, will also offer a front end engineering design (FEED) for the gas pipeline planned to link the southwestern Albanian cities of Fier and Vlora, Trend quoted Socar’s head of the department of relations with investors Kamran Huseynov as saying in a statement.
A preliminary feasibility study of the project is currently being developed by German company IMPaC Offshore Engineering and should be completed by the end of June, Huseynov said. Based on its results SOCAR will prepare a feasibility study.
The pipeline, which will connect the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) with a gas supply plant to be built near the city of Fier, will have an annual capacity of 1 billion cubic metres, according to the report.
Albania's government said in November it approved a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with the government of Azerbaijan for the development of Albania's gas master plan. The MoU sets the ground for assistance from SOCAR in the construction of the necessary infrastructure for the gasification of the country, with gas to be fed through TAP.
Albania is one of the European countries that will receive Azerbaijani gas within the Southern Gas Corridor.
The Southern Gas Corridor is a project for transportation of gas from the Caspian region to the European countries through Georgia and Turkey.