Turkey secures $1.2 billion financing to expand gas storage facility

ANKARA

Turkey has secured a $1.2 billion loan in total to expand the Gas Storage Expansion Project in Tuz Gölü (Salt Lake) in Central Anatolia.

During a press meeting in Ankara on June 27, BOTAŞ General Manager Burhan Özcan said the loans were secured from the World Bank and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) with highly advantageous repayment conditions and lower interest rates.

On the same day, the AIIB said its board of directors approved a $600-million loan for the project to increase the reliability and security of Turkey’s gas supply.

“The project will raise the capacity of the Tuz Gölü underground gas storage facility by 4.2 billion cubic meters [bcm] per year—from 1.2 bcm to 5.4 bcm—and will help improve Turkey’s energy security and reduce the carbon intensity of the power supply,” the AIIB said in a statement.

On May 22, the World Bank said its board of executive directors approved a $600 million loan for the Gas Storage Expansion Project in Turkey.

The gas storage facility now has a storage capacity of 550 million cubic meters.

During the press meeting, Energy Minister Berat Albayrak said the government aimed at raising this capacity to 5.4 bcm before 2023.

“With another facility in the northwestern district of Silivri, we will raise Turkey’s total gas storage capacity to 10 bcm,” Albayrak said.

The project is composed of 12 wells. From each well, a total of 40 million cubic meters of gas can be pumped into the country’s gas network on a daily basis.

The drilling of the first of the project’s 12 wells began in 2012 by state-run gas grid BOTAŞ and a Chinese company.