Azerbaijan enters global market through expanding its gas export [COMMENTARY]

The opening of the Bulgaria-Serbia interconnector in December is one of the important events in terms of expanding the geography of Azerbaijani gas exports.

According to Azernews, the head of the Azerbaijan Petroleum Research Center (ACE) Ilham Shaban said this in his comment to Day.az.

According to him, Azerbaijani gas has not yet reached Serbia, although they are already writing about it. So far, the interconnector, laid in February 2023, has just opened. Serbia will begin receiving Azerbaijani gas from January this year.

“In order for supplies to begin, all formalities accepted in Europe must be settled. In any case, the commissioning of this interconnector is, as President Ilham Aliyev said when speaking at its opening, a step aimed at expanding the geography of Azerbaijani gas exports. From year to year, Azerbaijan annually expands the geography of buyers of its oil and gas.

If we take a tour of the history of Azerbaijani gas exports, we will see that in 2007 Azerbaijan moved from the category of gas importers to the category of exporters of natural gas. Georgia became the first buyer of our gas, and then the gas was imported by Turkiye.

On the last day of 2020, Azerbaijani gas went to Greece and Italy. Bulgaria joined in 2021. Romania joined the list of buyers in 2023. Hungary will also begin receiving our gas in 2024. Serbia has already signed an agreement to purchase 400 "Azerbaijan has millions of cubic meters of gas. From 2027, these volumes are planned to increase to 1 billion cubic meters," the expert said.

The expert also noted that other countries are on the list of future buyers.

"Slovakia (1 billion cubic meters) and Albania (700 million cubic meters). Commercial agreements have not yet been signed, but the corresponding memorandums already exist and work is underway in this direction.

The instability experienced by the energy market due to geopolitical realities still continues," Ilham Shaban said.

Moreover, steps are being taken to connect the broken supply chain. The Bulgaria-Serbia interconnector and preparation for the import of Azerbaijani gas are components of this process.