Total has agreed to take over the deepwater Absheron exploration block in the Azeri sector of the Caspian Sea offshore Baku.
The French oil major is to take 60% of the equity in the production sharing agreement area with Azerbaijan’s stake oil company SOCAR holding the remainder, under the terms of a heads of agreement between the two.
And the move builds on Total’s existing position in Azerbaijan with 10% equity in the BP-operated Shah Deniz gas field which came onstream last December, and 10% in the South Caucasus Pipeline Company carrying Shah Deniz gas to Turkey and Georgia. Total also has 5% in the Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline carrying Azerbaijan production to the Mediterranean Sea at the Turkish port of Ceyhan.
Absheron is 100 km (62 miles) offshore from Baku with water depths up to 500 m (1,500 ft).