BP's BTC Oil Pipe Continues Exports, Output Cut 60%

By Eduard Gismatullin and Alaric Nightingale

Sept. 18 (Bloomberg) -- BP Plc, Europe's second-largest oil producer, said flows through its Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan crude pipeline are continuing after a gas leak cut output at Azeri fields 60 percent yesterday.

BP and partners are using crude accumulated at the Sangachal terminal at the beginning of the pipeline in Azerbaijan to maintain flows, Murat Lecompte, a BP spokesman, said by phone from Turkey today. There's also crude accumulated at Ceyhan.

BP shut two platforms at the Central and West Azeri fields in the Azerbaijan's part of the Caspian Sea after a gas leak yesterday. BP and partners produce an average of about 850,000 barrels a day from the Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli, or AGC, deposits, according to the London-based company.

``Tankers are being loaded from Ceyhan,'' Lecompte said. ``There's a production impact because ACG is producing at about 40 percent of its'' regular rate.

Lecompte declined to comment on when the lower output in Azerbaijan will affect exports.

``Three platforms are operating, two are still shut down,'' Tamam Bayatly, a BP spokeswoman in Baku, Azerbaijan, said by telephone today. ``We will investigate the cause of the gas and we will only restart the operation when we see that it's safe to do so.''

Bayatly declined to comment on when production will resume at the two platforms.

Azeri Crude

On Sept. 12, BP shut the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan, or BTC, pipeline, which carries Azeri crude oil from Baku across Georgia to Turkey's Mediterranean coast near Ceyhan, after a leak in the Turkish section required repairs.

The 1,100-mile link was shut down for about 20 days after an explosion on Aug. 5 in Turkey. The government said a malfunction was behind the accident and rejected a claim of responsibility from Kurdish guerrillas who said they bombed the pipeline.

BP still keeps the Baku-Supsa pipeline, which transports crude from Azerbaijan to Georgia's Black Sea coast closed because of security concerns, Bayatly said. Baku-Supsa shipments were halted on Aug. 12 because of Russia's offensive in Georgia.

To contact the reporter on this story: Eduard Gismatullin and Alaric Nightingale in London at egismatullin@bloomberg.net