AZLAB

A FUTURE RESEARCH CENTRE


Rafiqa Huseynzadeh General manager of AzLab.


The story of oil and gas recovery in Azerbaijan is known more than 100 years. The foreign scientists and experts have long been emphasizing particular quality of the AzeriLight oil blend, frequently used for medicinal purpose. And today, when Azerbaijan has gained the sovereignty and is realizing large-scale regional projects of the strategic importance jointly with foreign oil companies it is impossible to overestimate the commercial significance of the Azerbaijanian oil.

In 2005 Azerbaijanian oil is to make way into the open world markets. Availability of modern research and analytical centers that can classify exactly and even predict the results of these or other prospecting not only in Azerbaijanian, but also in the Caspian shelves of other littoral countries, is becoming a barest necessity with the growth of the topicality of the Azerbaijanian oil, as well as the exploration activities in the Caspian.

Just for the purpose AzLab was established in 1996 as a joint venture, to grow later in 1999 into a closed joint stock company (AzLab CSC). In a short time the Company converted into a research and analytical center and took a leading position in this kind of services and not only in Azerbaijan ... but far beyond.

Today we'd like to focus your attention to the Article of Rafiqa xanim Huseynzadeh General manager of AzLab.

As we have already mentioned above, AzLab is a closed joint stock company (AzLab CSC) , engaged in complex laboratory analyses of the largest oil and gas producers of the Caspian region. The Company has been working in this market for more than 7 years and within this time we have managed to acquire a new highly technological laboratory, meeting all the acceptable world standards of the research quality and for subsequent analyses of the initial material. The contemporary method and methods of doing business has attracted the attention of leading regional oil and gas producers. And to date the clients of AzLab are already such leading companies as SOCAR, AIOC, BP, ExxonMobil, ChevronTexaco, Salyan Oil, Karasu, Dragon Oil (Turkmenistan), Partex (Kazakhstan), Frontera Resources (Georgia) etc.

Today the Azlab laboratory includes the following structures:


  • PVT (Pressure, volume, temperature);
  • GeoChemical Analyses
  • Laboratory;
  • Conventional Core Laboratory ;
  • BioStratigrafical Laboratory.

    • Automatized PVT Laboratory

    The PVT laboratory should be noted particularly, which previously functioned in the structure of our laboratory on the basis of mercury and failed to meet the modern ecological requirements. We replaced the out-dated equipment by PVT, a new automated research facility worth of $700 000.

    The originality and value of the laboratory equipment tells for itself, as we have proceeded farther in our methodology and system of data processing, which affects directly the subsequent assessment of the oil reserves, drawing the field development project and estimating more accurately the residual reserves, etc.

    I can underline with pride that PVT type laboratory facilities are being used only in three countries of the world, i.e. the USA, Canada and now in Azerbaijan. And the entire management and maintaining personnel of the laboratory are 100% the citizen of Azerbaijan. Although the laboratory was installed in Baku by Canadian experts they trained our experts so as they could successfully and practically apply the knowledge and skills they have acquired in the research complex.

    As the result AzLab has, in fact, become a Caspian Center of laboratory research in the oil and gas industry today and is steady in the advanced positions of introducing the contemporary eco-technological innovations in future.

    Reliable results today are brilliant opportunities and potentials for the future development. And already this year Azlab is going to take part in a number of international tenders. We have already bought a good deal of super-precise equipment in Great Britain, the USA and Canada for the purpose and have submitted documents to obtain the ISO 9001 Certificate and we hope already in June we'll take possession of the Quality Certificate of the international pattern, which will enable us to expand considerably our analytical business at the terminals and pipelines.

    One of our basic services is the analyses and storage of the core.

    The thing is AzLab receives core samples for studies from Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, and we have recently won a tender in Uzbekistan and are now waiting for the samples to arrive from this Central Asian country, which we'll have not only to study and classify, but also to store.

    The fact is notable that any country of the world involved in this or other way in exploration and development of mineral resources, regards the presence of the core storage as a necessity. The value of the service is in subsequent saving of the resources to be spent for prospecting, developing and assessing the level of recovery both in new and old wells.

    Therefore, for further development of our business in the Caspian we have extended the sphere of services we grant, and have built a core storage at our own expense ($500 000), which can store up to 15 000 m of core, samples of oil and gas. The core storage has also a 150 meters viewing room to examine core, which meets all necessary world standards. And really our aspirations have justified themselves, as our core storage is "gold fund" of Azerbaijan and is of great national value.

    AzLab is conducting negotiations with the companies our potential clients in analyses of oil and gas for subsequent storage of the core samples from all contract areas in our core storage, and we are confident that we will guarantee the quality of storage at the highest level.

    Reference: The core storage has been built on the project of the leading Canadian experts of the world famous DATACON Company. All requirements of the oil companies were accomplished while building the core storage.


    AzLab Employees

    AzLab employees are highly qualified experts that have taken training courses in various foreign research centers (in Norway, Great Britain, the USA, etc) and petrochemical enterprises.

    We guarantee social welfare of our personnel at the highest level, high level of salaries, necessary insurance polices and cultural leisure, to be short we provide high living standards of our employees.

    AzLab, as it has been mentioned above, is proud that all her experts are local specialists. We hold weekly class periods on safety measures, and all the AzLab employees took part in workshops at BP Business Center and received certificates in this sphere.

    We can say for the conclusion that AzLab already holds steadily the leading positions in its sector of oil and gas industry, and our goal for the future is the confirmation of the Company's leadership in Azerbaijan and provision of the leading role of AzLab in the Caspian region.