Bulgaria boosts gas imports from Azerbaijan

Bulgaria has increased its gas imports from Azerbaijan, Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union, told Trend.

In July 2023, Bulgaria imported 77.3 million cubic meters of gas from Azerbaijan, marking a rise from the 74.8 million cubic meters recorded in June. This surge indicates a month-on-month increase of 3.3 percent in natural gas imports from Azerbaijan.

Notably, during the first seven months of the year, Azerbaijan exported a total of 536.7 million cubic meters of gas to Bulgaria.

While the volume of exports remained robust, the value of these gas exports during July amounted to 23.9 million euros, a slight decline from the 26.6 million euros recorded in June, marking a decrease of 10.2 percent.

Bulgaria initiated gas imports from Azerbaijan via the Greece-Bulgaria interconnector (IGB), which commenced operations on October 1, 2022. The IGB has a contractual capacity of 1 billion cubic meters per year, with the potential to expand to 3 billion cubic meters, ultimately upgradable to 5 billion cubic meters annually.

Azerbaijan, a crucial gas supplier to Europe, utilizes the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) as part of the Southern Gas Corridor, boasting a capacity of 10 billion cubic meters, expandable to 20 billion cubic meters annually. The Ministry of Energy of Azerbaijan reported that the country exported 6.6 billion cubic meters of gas to Europe from January through July 2023. Overall, gas exports for the same period amounted to 13.8 billion cubic meters, reflecting a robust 7 percent increase compared to the same period in 2022.

This increase in exports includes contributions from various gas fields, with 7.5 billion cubic meters sourced from the Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli field block, 15.4 billion cubic meters from the Shah Deniz field, 5.1 billion cubic meters produced by the State Oil Company, and 0.1 billion cubic meters from the Absheron field.