ECONOMY
TAP AG: 4 years later, pipeline construction and reinstatement in Albania substantially complete
Baku. April 3, AZERTAC
In April 2016, the first TAP pipes arrived in Albania. Shipments of equipment and machinery were being offloaded in Durrës. 4 years later, pipeline construction and reinstatement substantially complete, the Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) AG company said in its Twitter account.
The Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) was 93,5 percent completed at the end of February 2020. TAP is currently moving further into the project construction phase. Every day hundreds of meters of TAP’s Right of Way (ROW) are cleared, strung, welded, lowered into the trenches and backfilled, in line with the project construction steps and schedule.
More than 99 percent of trenching was completed along the Trans Adriatic Pipeline’s (TAP) route, TAP AG consortium earlier reported.
TAP’s first offshore pipelines (7km) in Albania were successfully installed and backfilled. This is part of the 105 km section across the Adriatic Sea that will link the gas pipeline to Italy’s transmission network.
The pipes will be laid on the Adriatic seabed: 37 km in Albanian territorial waters, 25 km in Italian territorial waters; and 43 km in international waters.
The 878km long pipeline will connect with the Trans Anatolian Pipeline (TANAP) at the Turkish-Greek border at Kipoi, cross northern Greece, Albania and the Adriatic Sea, before coming ashore in Southern Italy, where it will connect to Italy’s gas transportation grid operated by SNAM Rete Gas.
The Trans Adriatic Pipeline (TAP) will transport Caspian natural gas from the Shah Deniz 2 field to Europe.
TAP is the European section of the Southern Gas Corridor, enhancing Europe’s energy security and contributing to decarbonisation and the diversification of gas supplies.
TAP’s shareholding is comprised of BP (20%), SOCAR (20%), Snam (20%), Fluxys (19%), Enagás (16%) and Axpo (5%).