BTC Co board of directors meets in London

[17:05] 15/01/2004, Kazakhstan Today
http://engNews.gazeta.kz/art.asp?aid=305712

A regular session of BTC Co board of directors takes place today, on 15 January, in London. KZ-today correspondent has been advised in the press service of BP-Azerbaijan that the last "strokes" before the forthcoming conclusion of agreement between BTC Co. (operator for construction and operations of Baku-Tbilisi-Cheyhan pipeline) and international financial institutions on allocation of credits for financing of Baku-Tbilisi-Cheyhan construction project will be discussed at the meeting.

Earlier it was reported that the agreement inking ceremony was due to take place on 3 February. A package of 27 agreements is suggested to be inked with all creditors. The total volume of credit funds attracted for the project, including the interest on credits, will make $2.6 billion. In total $2.95 billion will be required for the construction of Baku-Tbilisi-Cheyhan project. (The total cost of the project is $3.6 billion, including the interest on credit).

In total loans for the BTC project will be allocated by four creditor groups. The first group will include international financial organisations (EBRD, IFC), which will allocate funds themselves and provide guarantees for commercial banks. The second group will consist of export and crediting agencies, which will provide guarantees to the commercial banks for financing material and equipment supplies from six economically developed world states - USA, UK, Japan, Germany, Italy, and France. The third group will include the commercial banks, the number of which oscillates from 10 to 30. The fourth group of creditors will include big companies, such as BP, Statoil, Total and ConocoPhillips, which are going to grant credits to the project. Among them, BP is going to grant a credit in the amount of $500 million and Statoil - not less than $170 million.

The participants of BTC project are: BP (30.1 %); SOCAR (25.00 %); Unocal (8.90 %); Statoil (8.71 %); TPAO (6.53 %); ENI (5.00 %); Itochu (3.40 %); ConocoPhillips (2.50 %); INPEX (2.50 %), Total (5.00 %) and Amerada Hess (2.36 %).

The length of BTC pipeline makes 1,767 km, of which - 443 km are in Azerbaijan, in Georgia - 248 km, in Turkey - 1076 km. The pipeline capacity is 50 million tons of oil per annum. The construction works started in April 2003 and will be completed in the 4th quarter of 2004. Moreover, the construction of Georgian part is planned to be completed in October, 2004, and the Turkish one - in November. The export of Azeri oil from Cheyhan port (Turkey) must start in the 2nd quarter of 2005.