Turkmen gas supplies via TAPI may start in 2020

By  Trend

The supplies of the Turkmen gas via the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline may start in 2020, said Muhammetmyrat Amanov, CEO of the TAPI Pipeline Company Limited.

He made the remarks at an international gas congress in Turkmenistan’s Avaza on May 24.

Turkmenistan’s Turkmengas state concern, which has a controlling stake in the TAPI Pipeline Company Limited, acts as the TAPI project manager.

TAPI will make it possible to deliver gas from Turkmenistan, which ranks fourth in the world for its gas reserves, to large and promising markets of South and Southeast Asia. The pipeline will run from Galkynysh - the largest gas field in Turkmenistan - through the Afghan cities of Herat and Kandahar, and finally reach the Fazilka settlement located near the India-Pakistan border.

The total length of the TAPI pipeline will be 1,814 kilometers. A 214-kilometer section of the pipeline will run through Turkmenistan, a 774-kilometer section will run through Afghanistan and an 826-kilometer section will run through Pakistan.

Turkmenistan started construction of its section of TAPI in December 2015 and it is expected it will take three years. In early May Turkmenistan said that construction works are in line with schedule. Time frame of the Afghan and Pakistani sections construction of the TAPI pipeline has not been determined yet. However the TAPI Pipeline Company Limited consortium developing the project has signed a contract with German ILF Beratende Ingenieure GmbH for the provision of services for the preliminary design and management of the project in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The technical work in the territory of these states has already started.

The project's preliminary cost is estimated at $10 billion. The Turkmen government said earlier that the state concern Turkmengas would be the main investor for the TAPI project.