The confrontation between Ukraine and Russia is helping to create an opening for another former Soviet state that wants to become a bigger gas supplier to Europe.
Azerbaijan — nestled between Russia to its north and Iran to its south — hopes its geographic and geopolitical position will help persuade the Obama administration to offer more vocal support for a $45 billion natural gas pipeline that would connect the country’s Caspian Sea drilling operations to Europe via Italy.
The so-called Southern Corridor would bypass Russia, Europe’s major gas supplier, and Ukraine, the main route for existing pipelines carrying the fuel west. And while Washington is caught up in debates about hastening US gas exports to weaken Vladimir Putin’s energy dominance, Azerbaijan maintains that its pipeline is the only shovel-ready means of giving Europe an alternative supply in the next few years.
The pipeline has its share of challenges — including the region’s always-tricky geopolitics and the risk that Russia could set out to undermine the project if it senses a threat to its interests. Still, the pipeline has drawn interest from members of Congress and has received public backing from top officials in the State Department. Secretary of State John Kerry gave the project a brief public support this month at an energy security meeting in Brussels, while the U.S. ambassador to Azerbaijan, Richard Morningstar, has been a big proponent of the pipeline since heading the Obama State Department’s special envoy for Eurasian energy.
Even supporters acknowledge, though, that the pipeline initially won’t carry enough gas to make much difference. The initial plan is for the pipeline to carry 16 billion cubic meters of natural gas annually — with 6 billion cubic meters to be used in Turkey and the rest reaching Italy and into the broader European market. In comparison, Russia contributes about 140 billion cubic meters annually to Europe, while total European Union demand is about 400 billion cubic meters a year.
The gas carried by the pipeline would especially help southeastern Europe, including meeting one-third of the gas needs for Bulgaria, which now gets all of its 3 billion cubic meters of gas each year from Russia. The project could also yield environmental benefits by helping Albania start replacing some of its coal use with gas.
In addition, potential exists for expanding the pipeline and tapping more into Azerbaijan’s estimated 30 trillion cubic feet of gas reserves. The project could also potentially link to a proposed Trans-Caspian pipeline that would bring gas from other former Soviet states like Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan.
Another possibility is tapping natural gas in northern Iraq, the eastern Mediterranean and perhaps Israel, which gets 40 percent of its oil from Azerbaijan. And the project could link to infrastructure north of Albania and up the Adriatic coast to Croatia, which is already integrated into a pipeline network with Hungary.
Darren Goode
(abridged version)
