Oil and gas were discovered Azerbaijan in the 19th century. The Azeri-Chirag-Gunashli oilfield, known as ACG, is at a depth of five kilometres below the Caspian Seabed about 170 km from port of Baku.
The hydrocarbons were made from plants and planktons which stored energy from sunlight but then got fossilised and compressed. The Azeri Light crude was formed between 3.4 and 5.3 million years ago, long before Homo sapiens evolved. It is transported by overland pipeline via Azerbaijan-Georgia-Turkey, then pipeline under Mediterranean Sea to Italy and lastly overland pipeline Italy-Austria-Germany-UK.
This history is repeated in thousands of such operations in close cooperation between nations and companies. British Petroleum 2035 Energy Outlookâs foresees energy demand to increase by 34% in the next 20 years.
However, the energy mix will not change very much between 2014 and 2035. Oil share will go down by 3%; gas up by 2%; coal down by 5%, nuclear up by 1%, hydro will remain the same and biofuels will grow by 6%. 50% of energy supply will be used in power generation. Car demand in USA and Europe will remain static, while in India and China it will grow substantially.
Nagin Khajuria
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