From left to right Helga Nes, StatoilHydro Executive VP, Gunnar Lilgequist, VP Nobel Heritage Foundation, Rovnag Abdullayev, President of Socar and Abulfaz Garayev, Minister of Culture and Tourism of Azerbaijan during the ribbon cutting ceremony at the Baku Museum Centre.
The Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli (ACG) oil field, the worlds largest producing offshore field with a current production rate of almost 900,000 bpd, forms today the backbone of the country’s economy.
Historical occasion
StatoilHydro executive vice president, Helga Nes,was in Baku in connection with the aniversary, and opened an exhibition co-sponsored by StatoilHydro and Socar dedicated to 130 years since the founding of the Nobel Brothers Company (BraNobel) in Baku, an event that is seen as pivotal to the development of the Azerbaijani oil industry.
ACG (2002)
“Today, we celebrate two great Azerbaijani oil success stories - 130 years since the Nobel Brothers started their historic oil company in Azerbaijan, and 15 years since the signing of the ‘Contract of the century’,” she stated. “Both successes are based on strong leadership, innovation and technological advances - while overcoming geo-political challenges.”
The Contract
A consortium of 11 foreign oil companies, including Statoil, concluded a 30-year agreement with the Azerbaijani government on the exploration, development and production of three offshore fields in the Azerbaijani sector of the Caspian Sea.
The resources and the endeavour were enormous in size and significance. Azerbaijan exports its ACG Light crude blend primarily to Turkish ports on the Mediterranean Sea through the 1700 km long Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline, the second longest in the world.
Core area
“ACG is a world scale project, 2.5 times bigger than the Statfjord field, and we in StatoilHydro are proud to be part of its success. Azerbaijan is one of the core areas in StatoilHydro’s international portfolio. We have been present in the country since 1992 and are the second largest investor in the country. So far in ACG and BTC we’ve invested more than USD 3 billion ; our average equity production year to date is approx. 70.000 bbld”, says Kristian Hausken, country manager for StatoilHydro in Azerbaijan.
ACG’s operator. ACG shareholders are BP (34.1%), Chevron (10.2%), Socar (10%), Inpex (10%), StatoilHydro (8.56%), ExxonMobil (8%), TPAO (6.8%), Devon (5.6%), Itochu (3.9%), Hess (2.7%).