Turkey to become key energy player with Iran: expert says
Posted by meb at February 11th, 2008
Only Iran can balance Russia’s dominance in supplying natural gas to European markets and Iran can only carry its reserves to Europe through Turkey, an energy security analyst told the Turkish Daily News, underlining that a recent alliance between Ankara and Tehran would change the global energy balance.
“In fact, Turkey has no intension to challenge Russia which provides 65 percent of its natural gas. But this is Russia that dislikes any of Turkey’s moves to diversify its sources. Both countries should see that no any regional energy project is possible without their cooperation,” stated Faruk Demir, who also has good connections with the Turkey’s Energy Ministry.
According to Demir, Turkey’s energy policy has recently entered into its third phase of “being a proactive global energy actor.” In the first two phases, Turkey’s policy was based on supplying its own energy needs and participating mainly in U.S.-made pipeline projects like Nabucco or transferring Caspian gas to southern Europe. But, Demir explains, since 2006 Turkey has established its own road map to implement its own energy policy that includes two-stage programs.
“One is a terminal program, the other is a corridor program,” maintains Demir, explaining that Turkey is considering establishing four energy terminals in Ceyhan, a port in southern Anatolia; one in Iğdır, an eastern Anatolian town on the Iranian border; one in Silopi, a southeastern Anatolian province close to Iraqi border and one in Aliağa, a port on the Aegean cost. “For example in the Iğdır energy terminal, we could jointly build a refinery, a power plant… depending on the development of our cooperation with Iran. These terminals will be similar to qualified industrial zones where we would provide investors with certain advantages and incentives…,” he said.
However Turkey’s main target in this program is to promote Ceyhan as a regional energy hub decorated with a set of plants. “In 20 years time 5 percent of the global oil and 3 percent of natural gas would flow to world markets via Ceyhan,” Demir added.
How to deal with Russia?
But to realize these targets, a very effective diplomacy and policy should be implemented said Demir. “Administrating the energy game in today’s world is like driving a train, so one should care about the balance between all the train cars,” he states.
Obviously, Russia is one of the most important players in the energy field and deserves very special treatment. Russia, the main gas supplier to European markets as well as to Turkey, began pursuing a more aggressive energy policy in recent years. Therefore any initiative Turkey is trying to take is seen as a step toward a counter-attack by Moscow, Demir said.
“Turkey’s plans to transfer Turkmenistan gas via its own territory or discussing with Kazakhstan in intensifying energy cooperation goes against Russia’s plans. But in fact these projects could always be handled with mutual efforts,” he said.
The cold war between Turkey and Russia continues on the subject of bypassing the already very busy Turkish straits via a new pipeline to carry Russian oil. Turkey’s pressure to convince Russia to flow its oil through homemade Samsun-Ceyhan pipeline resulted in Russia’s building a Bourgas-Alexandropulos pipeline (between Bulgaria and Greece).
“Does Russia want to nix Turkey’s plans over Ceyhan or just remains loyal to its companies’ economic interests? What we see is that Russia’s decision is political; that makes us think that Moscow wants to begin a new process of bargaining with Turkey,” Demir assessed.
One of the most important Russian targets is to realize the Blue Stream 2 project that would increase its supply to European markets via Nabucco pipeline that was originally designed to reduce Europe’s dependency to Russian gas.
“In the not-so-distant future, we could witness the realization of the Blue Stream 2 project but Russia’s cold behavior toward Turkey’s recent deal with Iran on natural gas based on the assumption that it’s a counter-attack to its policies is not promising to Turkey,” he underlined.
US not really opposing agreement with Iran
Turkey’s energy deal with Iran was full of question marks for many, including the U.S. and other key energy players. However, for Demir, this relation between two neighbors is not surprising. “Iran is in the top five countries in oil production and gas reserves. Let’s just consider how the global oil balances would shift if a new pipeline between Iran’s Tabriz and Turkey’s Ceyhan were to be built?”
Demir states that it is just an idea for the time being but it is a fact that two countries have already progressed in energy cooperation.
Last year, two countries’ energy ministers inked a preliminary agreement that foresees a broad cooperation in transferring Iranian and Turkmen gas to Europe via Turkey and in allowing Turkish companies to produce 20 billion cubic meters natural gas in the three phases of Iran’s South Pars gas field. The agreement is yet to be finalized by the two countries’ government.
“The integration of Iran into European markets via Turkey could be a big success for all of us,” Demir maintained.
However, the opposition of the U.S., Turkey’s close ally, to this agreement is no secret. According to the figures provided by Demir, Turkey’s total investment in Iran will be around $5 billion, which violates a U.S. law.
“I don’t think that Turkey’s initiative will create a huge a problem for the U.S. Some decision-makers in the U.S. prefer to use the definition of ‘tomorrow’s Iran’, meaning that they expect to see an Iran that has adopted itself to international system. In the energy game, one cannot ignore Iran,” he stated.
Message to Iraqi Kurds
According to Demir, in future planning Iraq will be one of the most important countries for Turkey. “Almost everybody understood that it is Iraq’s energy that will keep the country united. Those who oppose this strategy will lose. And for now this is the Iraqi Kurdish administration,” he said.
Underlining that Iraqi Kurdish groups have blocked the ratification of the Law of Oil that he says would work for the sake of all Iraqi people and not for one single region, Demir maintained that, “Turkey would only help Kurdish groups if they fully recognize the central administration.”
Source: Turkish Daily News
Related posts: