Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on August 20 announced the discovery of major natural gas reserves in the Black Sea, near the Turkish coast.
The country’s drillship Fatih found some 320 billion cubic meters (11.3 trillion cubic feet) of natural gas. Turkey aims to have the natural gas ready for public use in 2023.
“THE DEVELOPMENT COULD OFFER TURKEY SIGNIFICANT NATURAL GAS SUPPLIES”
Analysts said that this discovery could be in attracting international investments. The exploration could increase the appetite of foreign investors in the region, to fulfill the country’s recent goal of boosting such investments. Turkey will also have more flexibility in its new long-term gas supply contracts, and combined with the competitiveness of LNG, lower gas import prices would naturally follow. The country will be less reliant on Russian gas and benefit economically from the more flexible alternatives.
Norwegian energy intelligence firm Rystad Energy has estimated on Wednesday that Turkey could save up to a whopping $21 billion in gas import costs with the development of it recently hit Tuna-1 gas discovery in the Black Sea.
“TURKEY WILL BE LESS RELIANT ON IMPORTS IN THE FUTURE”
Rystad said that this would depend on the field’s peak output, which remains to be determined pending appraisal drilling and further testing. Actual savings could be even higher as global gas prices and import costs are expected to rise in coming years.
The successful development of the field would represent a substantial reduction to the country’s import costs – between $200 million and $1.5 billion per year – based on Turkey’s average gas import price for 2020, Rystad added.