Shah Deniz Partners to Provide Support to Turkish METU

BP and its co-venturers in the Shah Deniz consortium announced their new programme to support Turkey’s Middle East Technical University (METU) in providing technical training and international certification to Turkish engineers.

Under this programme, funding from the Shah Deniz consortium will enable a technical training and certification programme to be run at METU. The technical training will be focused on quality assurance for pipelines and gas transportation systems, in such areas as mechanical engineering, materials, and civil/structural engineering. The international certifications will focus on areas such as non-destructive testing (NDT), welding, inspections, electrical and instrumentation, and corrosion.

Rashid Javanshir, BP’s President for the Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkey Region, said: “With the implementation of the Shah Deniz Full Field Development project, gas from the Shah Deniz field in Azerbaijan will not only be exported to existing markets in Georgia and Turkey, but also to customers in Europe. Turkey has a critical importance in the transit value chain. As Turkey takes on this new role and becomes an energy hub for Europe, it must undertake important new projects, such as expansion of the current natural gas network or building new pipelines and storage facilities. The success of Turkey in the gas value chain lies in efficiency, reliability and integrity of its gas transmission systems, and this lies in the hands of qualified manpower. We are very pleased to have this opportunity to support this outstanding Turkish university in training engineers who we believe will significantly contribute to Turkey’s efforts as it undertakes this new critical role. ”

A formal agreement will be signed with METU over the coming weeks, and the programme will start in early 2012. The project will be coordinated by METU’s Petroleum and Natural Gas Engineering Department, and the facilities of the University will be used for both theoretical and laboratory sessions of the training. The programme is expected to run for four years, and result in training more than 300 pre-qualified, internationally certified pipeline engineers.

Shah Deniz Stage 2, or Full Field Development (FFD), is a giant project that will bring gas from Azerbaijan to Europe and Turkey. This will increase gas supply and energy security to European markets through the opening of the new southern gas corridor.

Shah Deniz participating interests are: BP (operator – 25.5%), Statoil (25.5%), SOCAR (10%), LUKOIL (10%), NICO (10%), Total (10%), and TPAO (9%).

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Offshore Energy Today Staff , November 25, 2011