MOL to buy Chevron’s Azerbaijan interests

MOL Group, Budapest, has agreed to buy Chevron Corp.’s major interests in Azerbaijan.

MOL will pay $1.57 billion for a 9.57% interest in Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli (ACG) offshore oil field and an effective 8.9% interest in the Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan (BTC) crude oil pipeline from Chevron Global Ventures Ltd. and Chevron BTC Pipeline. The consideration is subject to adjustments at closing, when Azerbaijan will become the 14th country in which MOL holds upstream interests.

ACG field, 120 km offshore, produced an average 584,000 b/d of oil and 6.4 million cu m/day of associated gas in 2018 from six platforms.

Partners earlier this year approved investment in a 48-slot drilling and production platform able to process 100,000 b/d of oil (OGJ Online, Apr. 19, 2019).

BP PLC is operator with a 30.37% interest. Other interests besides Chevron’s are State Oil Co. of the Azerbaijan Republic, 25%; Inpex, 9.31%; Equinor, 7.27%; ExxonMobil, 6.79%; Turkish Petroleum, 5.73%; Itochu, 3.65%; and ONGC Videsh, 2.31%.

The 1,768-km BTC pipeline carries crude from ACG field and condensate from offshore Shah Deniz field from the Sangachal terminal through Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Turkey to the Ceyhan terminal on the Mediterranean. It has throughput capacity of 1.2 million b/d.

BTC pipeline interests other than Chevron’s are BP, the operator, 30.1%; Azerbaijan (BTC) Ltd., 25%; Equinor, 8.71%; Turkish Petroleum, 6.53%; Eni and Total, 5% each; Itochu, 3.4%; Inpex and ExxonMobil, 2.5% each; and ONGC Videsh, 2.36%.

Source: OGJ