BTC cuts Azeri crude exports 26% in November

BTC delivered 26 million tons of Azeri oil in the first eleven months of 2014 compared with 27 million tons during the same period last year, Azerbaijan’s state energy company SOCAR said.

The sharp decline in exports was due to the closure of the Central Azeri platform in the Caspian Sea last month.

BP shut the platform for planned maintenance on October 31 and reopened it on November 27.

BTC exported a combined 620,436 tons of Turkmen and Kazakh oil in November, up from 429,223 tons a year earlier.

Azerbaijan, the third largest oil producer in the former Soviet Union, also uses the Western Route Export Pipeline (Baku-Supsa) and Baku-Novorossiysk pipeline to export oil.