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New compressor complex to feed Turkmenistan-Iran gas route

ASHKHABAD, December 17 (Itar-Tass) - A new gas compressor station began operations on western Turkmenistan's Keymir field on Tuesday, the country’s president, Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedow, said in a speech published to mark its coming on stream.

The complex is designed to transfer around one billion cubic metres of natural gas to a collecting station and onward to the 200-kilometre, 8 billion cubic metre-a-year Turkmenistan-Iran pipeline.

This facility will harness and compress normally low-pressure associated gas from local border fields, previously burnt off and causing environmental damage for many years.

On the other side of the country, the 30.5 kilometre, 12.5 billion cubic metre-a-year Dauletabad-Sarakhs-Khangiran eastern pipeline has been operating since 2010.

This route is supplied from Dovletabad, the country’s biggest gas field, sending supply to destinations including Russia.

China is the biggest consumer of Turkmen gas with an annual contract to buy around 65 billion cubic metres extracted mostly from the Galkinish field, on stream since 2013.

Turkmenistan was scheduled to extract around 77 billion cubic metres of gas in 2013, of which 44 billion cubic metres were for export.

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