Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan have signed a memorandum of understanding on joint exploration and development of Dostluk field in the Caspian Sea, the Turkish Foreign Ministry reported Jan. 21.
While no specific details were given, TIbrahim Ahmadov, deputy head of the public relations and events at State Oil Co. of Azerbaijan Republic (SOCAR), told Trend News Agency that reserves of the oil and gas field “can be approved by carrying out modern methods of seismic exploration and probably, exploratory drilling,” and that “technical and commercial issues related to the future development” of the field will need to be outlined.
During the Soviet period, Ahmadov told Trend, exploratory works showed reserves similar to Karabagh field. In March 2020, SOCAR and Equinor confirmed a discovery at Karabagh, 120 km offshore Baku in the Azerbaijan sector of the Caspian Sea (OGJ Online, Mar. 24, 2020). At the time, SOCAR’s president, Rovnag Abdullayev, said the estimated size of discovered volumes at Karabagh—some 60 million tons—is enough to pursue commercial development.
Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, ownership of the field was disputed. In 2018, the Convention on the Legal Status of the Caspian Sea was signed by Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Azerbaijan, and Iran, marking the beginning of efforts to clarify oil and gas rights and accommodate development of a long-discussed pipeline to carry gas from Turkmenistan to Europe via Azerbaijan and Turkey (OGJ Online, Aug. 6, 2018).
