Luca Schieppati: TAP to guarantee continuity of direct supplies from Caspian Sea to Europe

Since the start of commercial operations, the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) has transported more than 27 billion cubic meters of gas to Europe, of which over 23 billion cubic meters have been exported to Italy, TAP Managing Director Luca Schieppati said at the Italian Energy Summit, Report informs.

“So, in essence, we have made a key contribution to security of supply and market liquidity. This happened thanks to the work on the commissioning of long-term contracts, according to which 10 billion cubic meters of gas are transported annually, 8 billion cubic meters of which are intended for Italy, and short-term capacities. We are using the gas pipeline more and more flexibly, we have products that practically allow us to transport gas not only, as usually happens, from east to west, but also from west to east, as well as deliver gas from Greece to Europe,” Schieppati noted.

This allowed Greece, for example, to store gas in Italian storage facilities last year, giving it flexibility, he added.

“We must continue to move in this direction to guarantee in the future such continuity of transport services, which are transported directly from the Caspian Sea to Europe, based on long-term contracts,” said Schieppati.

As the managing director emphasized, TAP became absolutely strategic since it guaranteed 15% of gas demand in Italy in 2022.

The TAP pipeline is intended to transport gas to Europe from the Shah Deniz field in the Azerbaijani sector of the Caspian Sea as part of the second stage of its development.

In 2022, Azerbaijan increased gas exports by 18% to 22.3 billion cubic meters, supplies to Europe amounted to 11.4 billion cubic meters (an increase of 39%). In 2022, gas supplies to Italy via TAP amounted to 10.325 billion cubic meters (an increase of 43.1%).

According to Eurostat, in 2022, EU countries - Italy, Greece and Bulgaria - imported 15.599 billion euros worth of natural gas from Azerbaijan (a fourfold increase over the year). During the reporting period, Italy imported natural gas from Azerbaijan worth 13.253 billion euros (an increase of 3.9 times).

For 2023, gas exports from Azerbaijan are planned at 24.5 billion cubic meters, of which about 12-12.5 billion cubic meters will go to Europe.